Profile – Green Zone

Curriculum Vitae

Education:

University of East Anglia, UK and University College Dublin, Ireland
Qualifications:

Bachelor of Science in Agriculture, Master of Science in Plant Genetics and Crop Improvement, Doctor of Philosophy in Biological and Environmental Science
Work History:

I worked in India, UK and Ireland
Current Job:

Crop Improvement - Research Technologist
Employer:

Teagasc – An Irish Agriculture and Food Development Authority

Oak Park House

Favourite thing to do in science: Observe and perform experiments
About Me: I am an enthusiastic and passionate researchers, with a friendly and caring nature. I love to train new generation of researchers.
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I am living in Carlow with my wife. We both love gardening and growing house plants. We have around 40 houseplants that include mostly air cleaners; spider plant, snake plant, Ivy, aloe vera, etc. I spend time watching Big Bang Theory on a routine basis, the humor has relaxing effect, while to calm myself, I do meditation and yoga in the morning and do some cooking.
My Work: I am a plant scientist based in beautiful campus of Teagasc Crop Science department in Oak Park, surrounded by plenty of greenery. My work involves field trials to perform disease screening, lab experimentation on molecular and microbial studies, and managing glasshouses. One of the important part of my work is training others on the novel scientific techniques and communicating science to all.
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I take responsibility to conduct the experimentation in the laboratory such as genetically manipulating the genomes of microbes and plants for enhancing their utility. As we get diseases, plants also get infected with diseases. Therefore, as plant scientists we are responsible to breed novel plant varieties with improved disease resistance that help farmers growing better crops and produce food for all.

In-vitro regeneration of plants

Students scoring potato plants for diseases
My Typical Day: My typical day includes responding to emails, meeting with my line manager and students/researchers of my team, glasshouse audit, performing experiments, observing and helping others, training new students/staff.
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My work start with a routine walk to the lab and glasshouses to make sure if everything is in order for all team members. We take time for a lab chat about the days work, which helps us to work more efficiently. Then I observe my ongoing experiments, organise the weekly seminar and meet my line manager. After my coffee break at 1100 am, I start working in lab until lunch time. Thereafter, I collect data from ongoing experiments in glasshouse/field. I like taking pictures of my experiments as supporting evidence of my results. The day ends while I analyse the data and draw meaningful conclusions from the results obtained.

Some days, do involved communicating science to young researchers, farmers and attending scientific conferences. This gives me the opportunity to travel different countries and meet more scientists.

I would like to highlight that every day of my scientific career differs, as the work goes along. I feel that every day brings novel opportunities for me to learn and become a better scientist and a person.

My Interview
- How would you describe yourself in 3 words?
  
  Approachable, Passionate, Curious
  
  Who is your favourite singer or band?
  
  Ed Sheeran and country music
  
  What's your favourite food?
  
  Home cooked vegetarian dishes
  
  What is the most fun thing you've done?
  
  Playing with colours
  
  What did you want to be after you left school?
  
  Doctor
  
  Were you ever in trouble at school?
  
  Not really
  
  What was your favourite subject at school?
  
  Science and language
  
  What's the best thing you've done as a scientist?
  
  Training others, I really like preparing the next generation of researchers
  
  What or who inspired you to become a scientist?
  
  My teacher
  
  If you weren't a scientist, what would you be?
  
  Chef
  
  If you had 3 wishes for yourself what would they be? - be honest!
  
  Travel the world. Experience space life. Make a plant that can give different fruits throughout the year.
  
  Tell us a joke.
  
  When Magnesium and Oxygen started dating I was like, "O MG!"

Work photos:

Biotechnology Building, where I am based.

Biotech glasshouse facility, the one I manage

Restocking of lab supplies

Late blight of potato on tuber slice (left) and leaves (right) infected with Phytophthora infestans

Wheat fields, image taken by a drone

Potatoes grown via in-vitro tissue culture on nutrient media

Performing genome sequencing of microbe using Nanopore MinIon, a revolution in Next Generation of sequencing platforms