Meet the UCL Genomics team

Dr Mark Kristiansen
Head of UCL Genomics Facility

After studying in Liverpool and Munich, I then completed a PhD and post-doc in Clinical Neuroscience at the UCL Institute of Neurology. I joined UCL Genomics in 2010 where I am currently the Facility Manager. I am an Associate Professor (Teaching) and the co-Director of the MSc Personalised Medicine and Novel Therapies programme at UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health.

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Dr Rachel Williams
Head of Sequencing and Facility Manager

I have a background in micro and molecular biology and finally moved out of the lab in 2013 when I became the project manager on a large FP7-funded project, PATHSEEK, which aimed to use NGS technologies to sequence whole genomes of different bacterial and viral pathogens directly from clinical samples.  At the end of PATHSEEK and to make the knowledge we had gained available to both UCL researchers and external users worldwide, we established the Pathogen Genomics Unit (PGU). In 2020, the PGU merged with UCL Genomics where I am the Head of sequencing.

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Tony Brooks
Applications Specialist

Shortly after graduating from Queen Mary in 1999, I began working for GlaxoSmithKline, helping to develop their UK in-house high-throughput genotyping pipeline. From here I moved to KBiosciences (now part of LGC), a start-up company performing similar genotyping with a novel chemistry, that I helped develop and optimise. In 2006 I moved back into academia to the Imperial/MRC Microarray Centre at Hammersmith Hospital, running both Affymetrix genotyping and expression arrays as well as updating and maintaining their data-warehouse, MIMIR. I joined UCL Genomics in 2009, initially to work with microarrays, but soon moved into the sequencing arm, gaining comprehensive experience on both the Roche 454 and then Illumina SBS instruments. I am currently involved in optimisation and automation of library prep, sequencing. I also built and maintain the groups Sequencing LIMS and RNA-seq analysis pipeline.

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Dr Paola Niola
Application Specialist

I studied at the University of Cagliari (Italy) where I completed a degree in Biology and a PhD in Neuroscience, focusing on the genetic role of microRNAs as peripheral biomarker in bipolar suicide patients. During my PhD, I had the opportunity to spend three months at the Advance Sequencing Facility at the Francis Crick Institute (London, UK) where I gained expertise in next generation sequencing. I joined UCL Genomics in April 2016 where I am a lead applications specialist in QC platforms and sequencing, mainly dealing with sample quality control and sequencing projects (library preparation and sequencing) using Illumina platforms.

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Gaganjit Madhan Kaur
Applications Specialist

I graduated from Imperial College London with a Bachelor's degree in Biomedical Sciences and then undertook a Master's course in drug discovery and development from London School of Pharmacy, UCL. During my Master's course I had the opportunity to be part of an early drug discovery project at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK). My project looked at biophysical characterization of ligand binding to epigenetic reader domains. Soon after graduation, I joined ICH under the HIGH-5 project, which aims to address a major challenge in the understanding of rare childhood diseases by integrating genomic, clinical and molecular phenotype information from patients. I joined UCL Genomics in 2016 as an Application Specialist (microarrays).

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Leysa Forrest
Applications Specialist

I hold a BSc in Molecular Biology from Royal Holloway, University of London and an MSc in Cell and Gene Therapy from UCL GOS ICH. I joined the UCL Genomics team in June 2019 as an Applications Specialist, working mainly with automated extraction projects, microarrays for methylation profiling and genotyping as well as sample quality control. I love working at UCL Genomics because we work as one big team and it gives me the chance to collaborate on a diverse array of fascinating projects, so no two days are ever the same!

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Nathan Dunton
Applications Specialist

After graduating with a Batchelor’s degree in Biomedical Science, I spent almost five years working as a Research Assistant at the NIHR Biomedical Research Centre at Queen Mary University of London. During this time, I was responsible for looking after a cardiac tissue biobank as well as supporting a host of other translational and clinical studies conducted at St Bartholomew’s Hospital. In 2019, I undertook an MSc in Cell and Gene Therapy at the UCL GOS Institute of Child Health before joining the UCL Genomics team in October 2020, where I currently work as an application specialist on the microarray stream.

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Helena Tutill
Applications Specialist

After graduating from UCL with a B.Sc. in Biology I spent ten years at Imperial College working on endocrine-related cancers.  In collaboration with the University of Bath I worked on several drug discovery projects characterising novel therapies for breast and prostate cancers.  In 2012 I returned to UCL to work on the EU-funded PATHSEEK project which sought to use next generation sequencing technologies to generate whole genome sequences of high-profile pathogens directly from clinical extracts without the need for culture.  On the back of this project, we set up the Pathogen Genomics Unit (PGU) at the beginning of 2016 which joined with UCL Genomics in early 2020.  My main interest remains pathogen sequencing, particularly of RNA viruses, and I specialise in library preparations using target enrichment and automation.

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Charlotte Williams
Applications Specialist

I have a Biochemistry BSc from the University of Bath and have worked as a Research Assistant in various research labs, including at the University of Iowa (cell biology) and Kings College London (zebrafish neurodevelopment). In 2015 I joined the Breuer lab at UCL where I trained in high-throughput NGS library preparation and sequencing as part of the PATHSEEK project, which involved genomic sequencing of 8 pathogens from clinical samples. I participated in establishing the Pathogen Genomics Unit sequencing service in 2016 and developed my skillset to become an Applications Specialist particularly experienced in pathogen sequencing. I moved with PGU to the ZCR in 2020 and merged with the team at UCLG. I am currently the technical lead on the SARS-CoV-2 whole genome sequencing pipeline at UCL.

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Patricia Dyal Bynoe
Applications Specialist

I was a Senior Research Assistant at the Natural History Museum (NHM), providing molecular research support in various programs. I gained a MPhil in 1999 at University of East London/Natural History Museum which focused on the use of ribosomal RNA sequences for the phylogeny and identification of non-cultivatable Protozoa. In 2015, I was reassigned to help develop NGS at the NHM, working on archival museum specimens, environmental samples to all non-human samples, with emphasis on methodology development and trouble shooting.

In 2019, I joined the Pathogen Genomics Unit (PGU) facility at UCL in 2019, which merged with UCL genomics in 2020, where I am a lead applications specialist working mainly on target-enrichment based viral pathogen whole-genome sequencing and general sequencing projects (library preparation and sequencing) using Illumina and Nanopore platforms.

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Saba Asam
Applications Specialist
(Research Fellow in Single Cell Genomics)

I have recently undertaken my PhD in Immunology from the University of Birmingham where I developed my single cell analysis toolkit as part of my thesis project exploring fibroblast heterogeneity in autoimmunity. To further expand my knowledge in the realm of big data and transcriptomic analysis I have joined UCLG to co-ordinate and develop the single cell service alongside other facility members.

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Marius Cotic
Applications Specialist

I completed my BSc in Biomedical Science at the University of Birmingham, followed by an MSc in Pharmacology from the University of Oxford. My main interests revolve around the identification of novel risk genes and biomarkers for psychiatric conditions, as well as the mutational dynamics of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. I joined UCL Genomics in October 2020, focusing on the rapid sequencing of SARS-CoV-2 as part of the COG-UK HOCI study and Public Health England surveillance. I was part of the COVID-19 sequencing team routinely using a range of Illumina and Oxford Nanopore platforms for high-throughput sequencing before moving to the microarray stream in June 2022 and starting a part time PhD.

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Nadua Bayzid
Applications Specialist

I graduated with a BSc. in Biomedical Science from the University of the West of England, during which I undertook a placement year at MRC The Gambia as part of the PROLIFICA study contributing to viral investigations into HBV and hepatocellular carcinoma. My following experience included high-throughput genotyping of various diseases modules in mice at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology, where I focused on automated applications. I recently contributed to a follow-up study, MATCH-B, at MRC The Gambia in a similar area as my placement year. As a current member of the Covid Sequencing Team within the PGU stream at UCL Genomics, I have a strong interest in virology and have gained experience in pathogen genomics within a greatly experienced team.

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(vacant)
Bioinformatician

Theodoros Xenakis (Dorian)
Research Fellow (Single Cell Genomics)

I am a Research Fellow in Single Cell Genomics in the Genetics and Genomic Medicine Programme at the Institute of Child Health. Prior to this I spent over 5 years working on various projects with NGS applications at Queen Mary University’s Barts and the London Genome Centre, including numerous single cell genomics projects. I am excited to be able to offer support to the development of the single cell sequencing service at UCL Genomics.

Professor Sergi Castellano
Academic Lead, UCL Genomics

Sergi Castellano is a Professor of Genomics and Academic Lead of the Genomics Science Technology Platform at UCL, with expertise in high-throughput genomics, bulk and single-cell, and its computational analysis to deliver research and translation

Professor Judy Breuer
Academic Lead, UCL Genomics

Dr Sunando Roy
Bioinformatician

Sunando Roy is a bioinformatician working in the Division of Infection Immunity and Inflammation at the University College of London. He is responsible for the analysis of NGS data from multiple pathogens as part of UCL Genomics. He graduated with a PhD in 2012 from the Pennsylvania State University where he worked on the evolution of viral proteins in different host species. He spent the next three years at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta working on the molecular epidemiology of Rotavirus. There he developed pipelines for Rotavirus sequence assembly and analysis which are still used routinely for monitoring outbreak cases every season. In 2015 he joined UCL as part of the PathSeek project to help develop enrichment based pathogen sequencing from clinical samples. He is currently leading the Bioinformatics on Covid Sequencing at UCL as part of the COG-UK consortium.