I am co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) at Biocentis, an Imperial College spinout developing solutions for genetic control of the world’s most dangerous insects.

Biocentis

Biocentis has the vision is to improve public health, food security, and the environment by targeting some of the few insect species that spread disease to humans and animals, destroy important crops, or threaten biodiversity.

Towards this aim, I lead a team of world-leading researchers and experts in the development of genetically modified insect strains that can be used for safe, effective, and sustainable control. We have developed a technological platform that allows unparalleled control of insect pest populations, and the genetic traits we introduce, over space and time. These inventions form the basis of four patent applications.

Research Funding

I am PI of two ongoing projects, an award of €5M from the Wellcome Trust entitled “Next-generation genetic control technologies to effectively suppress wild populations of Aedes aegypti mosquitoes”, and a €3.25M project funded by the Italian Fund for Applied Sciences (FISA) entitled “Development of New Tools for Biocontrol of Insects (deNOTE)”.

Background

A molecular biologist by training, my career spans 15 years of research at Imperial College London, Johns Hopkins University, and Biocentis.

My interest in the field began in the Crisanti lab at Imperial College where, during my PhD (2012-2016), I helped advance CRISPR-technologies for use in insects, and later developed the first gene drive system designed to spread through natural populations of the African malaria mosquito. Gene drives are selfish genetic elements that can be inserted into the genome of harmful insects, and used to modify entire populations for sustainable control. In theory, the strategy could help eliminate disease across entire regions of Africa by releasing just a very small number of modified insects into the environment. Since we first demonstrated the potential in mosquitoes, we uncovered key weaknesses and worked to improve it, leading to the creation of an extremely effective gene drive that received worldwide attention as a potential game changer towards the eradication of malaria. Motivated to translate scientific advances into real world intervention, I lead a first-of-its kind collaborative effort to test gene drive technology at scale, as a bridge between lab- and field- testing.

This revolutionary research took place at a state-of-the-art facility in Italy – where Biocentis now runs its R&D operations – and received widespread attention by the mainstream media, scientists and national government bodies including the US National Academy of Sciences and the UK House of Lords. Our work has been published in leading scientific journals including Nature Biotechnology, Nature Communications and PNAS. The totality of these projects was made possible by the incredible mentorship, and later collaboration, of Dr Tony Nolan and Professor Andrea Crisanti, and the support of the department. Read our published articles at Google Scholar.

Between 2019-2021 I led a cross-boarder collaborative project aimed at understanding the neurogenetics underlying mosquito host-seeking behaviour as a Sir Henry Wellcome Fellow. This research was co-sponsored by Dr Tony Southall (Imperial College), Dr Conor McMeniman (John’s Hopkins University) and Professor Stephen Goodwin (Oxford University). The Wellcome funded project was used to develop new tools for optogenetics in the malaria mosquito that allow visualisation and functional characterisation of the neurons and genes that are needed by mosquitoes to hunt down humans.

Prior to joining Biocentis, I was honoured to receive the Sir Henry Wellcome Fellowship and the 2020 early career biochemist of the year.

Academic appointments

I currently hold two academic positions, as Senior Lecturer (honorary) at Imperial College London, and Adjunct Assistant Professor at Johns Hopkins University. At each I continue to teach and supervise graduate students as part of academia-industry partnerships. 

Publicity

What next for gene drives (Science News, 2022)

Genetic engineering test with mosquitoes ‘may be game changer’ in eliminating malaria (Guardian, 2021)

Science moves closer to killing malaria with mutant mosquitoes (WIRED, 2019)

Giving Malaria a Deadline (The New York Times, 2018)

A new genetic-engineering technology could spell the end for malaria (The Economist, 2018)

Gene editing wipes out mosquitoes in the lab (BBC, 2018)

To Fight Malaria, Scientists Try Genetic Engineering To Wipe Out Mosquitoes (NPR, 2016)

The extinction invention (MIT Technology Review, 2016)
 
Become a gene drive researcher!

Interested students can get involved in genetic control research by contacting me for internship or graduate research opportunities at Biocentis, or as joint Imperial College – Biocentis graduate placements.

Awards

2020 Biochemical Society Early Career Researcher Award (video)

2019 Imperial College President's Award for Outstanding Early Career Researcher

2018 Sir Henry Wellcome Postdoctoral Fellowship (£300,000, 4 years)

2018 1st Prize, Oral Presentation, Annual Symposium of Wellcome Trust-Imperial Centre for Global Health Research

2017 1st Prize, Oral Presentation, Imperial College London Life Sciences Post-Doc Symposium

2017 2nd Prize, Poster Presentation, EMBO Conference– Molecular and Population Biology of Mosquitoes and Other Disease Vectors

2017 Finalist, STEM for Britain National Science Competition, UK Parliament

2014 1st Prize, Annual PhD Competition Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College London