Rich Mayne

Biomedical Scientist

Ever since I first learned about genetics, I’ve been hooked. There’s something so satisfying and elegant about boiling down all of the complicated biological processes in a live organism to a set of simple instructions. I had originally wanted to be a nurse, but in my late teens decided to change path to study something more genetics-y after reading “The Selfish Gene”.

I studied biomedical sciences at the University of the West of England (UWE), Bristol, and was briefly a histologist (a scientist who studies tissues to look for signs of disease) in the NHS. I found I was most interested in research, though, so decided to do a PhD in computer science, also at UWE. I have since done several postdoctoral research contracts over a course of about seven years, at the intersection between biology and computing.

I’m lucky enough to now be working on a fascinating multi-centre project that’s focussed on making sure that NHS Blood and Transplant’s blood supply remains microbiologically safe amid new and emerging threats, including future pandemics. The biggest part of my job involves writing software for piecing together and analysing the genomes of harmful microbes that we might detect in an unwell person’s blood, although I still do a little lab work occasionally. I have a particular interest in using genomics to work out how closely related viruses are to each other, and how we can use this information to better adapt treatments for the infections they cause.