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Pooja Patel - Analyst in the civil service

Pooja graduated from her Biomedical Science BSc at Sussex in 2018 and now works as an analyst at the Ministry of Defence. She was part of the taskforce that helped house homeless people in hotels during the covid-19 lockdowns. She also talks about all the transferable skills you learn from your degree that are hugely valuable in the civil service. Pooja is also a big advocate for equality and diversity within the civil service.

Dr Sonya Towers - Funding Manager at the Wellcome Trust

Sonya did her Chemistry BSc degree at Sussex before progressing onto an MSc in advanced microscopy and imaging. This led her to transition into a cell biology PhD at Sussex. She then went on to work at the Wellcome Trust; first as a funding manager and more recently as part of their research culture team. She speaks very positively about the working culture and career progression at Wellcome. She also greatly values the transferable skills learnt during her time at Sussex.

Dr Rosalind Holmes - Senior Patent Attorney for Pharma

Ros did her undergraduate MSci degree in Biochemistry and Biological Chemistry at Nottingham University. She then moved to Sussex to undertake her PhD in DNA repair and replication before deciding to train as a Patent Attorney at Proctor and Gamble. She is now a Senior patent attorney at Sanofi and is based in Germany. Ros shares her experiences of her current role and the process of becoming qualified as a patent attorney. She places great value on her time at Sussex as a research scientist; experience which really helps her relate to her scientist clientele. Again, she was very positive about the gender balance in patent law.

Dr Iga Abramowicz - Clinical Trials Manager

Iga carried out her undergraduate and MSc degrees in Poland where she studied Biotechnology. She then did her PhD in Birmingham before joining Sussex to work as a post-doc in the genome damage and stability centre. She now works as a clinical trials manager at BSMS. Iga talks about what’s involved in being a clinical trials manager, the challenges faced during the pandemic and how compatible her work is with family life.

Dr Ann-Sofie Schreurs - NASA Space Biologist

Ann-Sofie did her undergraduate and MSc degree at Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris where she studied cellular and molecular biology. She then moved to Sussex where she did her PhD in DNA replication. She was awarded a student prize from the European space agency which spurred her on to apply for a post-doc at NASA, where she worked for many years and became a principle investigator. She primarily researches the effect space flight has on loss of bone density. Ann-Sofie is very positive about the progress that has been made on gender equality in science and a passionate advocate of outreach work to promote greater visibility of female space biologists.

Dr Beth Nicholls - Ecologist and UKRI Future Leaders Fellow

Beth carried out her PhD at Exeter followed by a post-doc at Rothamsted research. She then joined Sussex as a post-doc studying bee behaviour and pioneering the citizen science project ‘Team PolliNATE’. Beth then spent some time outside of academia as an outreach officer for South Downs National Park. She was then awarded the very prestigious UKRI future leaders fellowship and has just set up her own research group at Sussex. Beth is passionate about public engagement in science. She is also an active advocate of equality and diversity in science. 

Dr Claudia Gray - Species Conservation Biologist

Claudia is a conservation biologist who previously worked at Sussex on rewilding and biodiversity projects. She has since moved on to work for the EDGE of Existence programme which supports species conservation efforts all over the world. Claudia is now a programme manager for species recovery at Zoological society of London where she continues to assist in numerous species conservation projects all over the world. As well as discussing work in species conservation, we also discuss the challenges of being a working parent to your children and strides forward that have been made in gender equality.