Research Associate in the Genome Stability Lab

Email: [email protected]

My overall research interests focus on how ubiquitin and ubiquitin-like signalling regulate chromatin-related processes. Currently, I am investigating the function of these post-translational modifications in the context of intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs) relevant to DNA repair pathways and genome stability.

My training is in molecular biology and protein biochemistry, with expertise in using purified, recombinantly produced physiologically-relevant protein reagents to recapitulate the complex signalling that takes place within cells and tissues. Using these systems, I can test pathological and disease-related mutations to see the mechanisms by which they act in these processes to better understand the underlying biology.

Ben completed his Masters (MSci) in Natural Sciences from the University of Cambridge, with his thesis project focussing on the function of a ubiquitin-related modifier, Urm1, in Archaea. He moved to the MRC London Institute of Medical Sciences (LMS) in 2013 for his doctoral research with Till Bartke, investigating the role of combinatorial chromatin modifications and how they are written and read. He continued this research at the Institute of Functional Epigenetics (IFE) at the Helmholtz Zentrum in Munich, focussing on how UHRF1 ubiquitylates histone H3 in its role for maintaining DNA methylation after replication. At the end of 2018, Ben moved to the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Oxford to investigate the function and activity of deubiquitylases (DUBs) in DNA repair using a range of biochemical and structural biology approaches. Ben joined the lab in Summer 2023 as a Postdoctoral Research Associate to study the role of intrinsically disordered regions (IDRs) in ubiquitin/ubiquitin-like signalling relevant to genome stability.