I graduated with a BSc in Biomolecular Science at Portsmouth in 1976 and stayed on in Prof Crane-Robinson's laboratory for my PhD studies on modifications of chromatin structure. I worked in Prof Morton Bradbury's lab (Davis, California) in 1980 and 1981 analysing acetylated chromatin using high-resolution melting studies. I returned to Portsmouth for a series of postdoctoral posts and characterised the usage of acetylation sites in the core histones, determined the attachment site of ubiquitin in uH2B and mapped a variety of histone modifications at a variety of chicken genes using chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) experiments. I was appointed as senior lecturer in 1991 and reader in 2005 and continue my research in my role as Associate Dean Research.

My main research interests are functional studies of chromatin, focusing on 'where' modified histones and histone variants are located in the genome, 'when' they appear in development and elucidating the mechanisms by which modified histones effect gene regulation. Other research interests include; investigating molecular approaches to improving detection of colon cancer metastases and development of prognostic indicators (in collaboration Prof A Parvais, Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust).