About me

Hi! My name is Amelia and I am doing a PhD at the University of Leeds, funded by the White Rose BBSRC DTP. Following my A-Levels I went on to study Microbiology with Virology at the University of Leeds. During my undergraduate, I was offered the opportunity to transfer onto the Integrated Master’s degree due to my high academic achievement. This enabled me to spend an extended period of time in a laboratory environment working on the relationship between Hazara virus and host cell apoptosis. The work produced was published in the Journal of Virology. This gave me the interest and confidence in the scientific field to pursue a career in research.

My project

I am just about to begin the third year of my PhD, where I am studying the arenaviruses. The Arenaviridae family contains significant pathogens that cause widespread disease and pose a threat to human health. Arenaviruses possess an RNA genome that is wrapped up by the viral nucleocapsid protein (NP) to form the protective ribonucleoprotein (RNP) complex. RNPs are essential for viral gene expression and assembly, and therefore can be a potential drug target. My PhD project investigates the structure of the NP and how it recognises the viral RNA, in addition to the formation, structure and packaging of the RNP. My project utilises cryo-electron microscopy and electron tomography to understand the structure of the virus. I will also investigate how the RNP is packaged into the virus particle and potentially reconstruct the structure of the RNP. Additionally, I am optimising bacterial expression of SUMO-tagged LCMV NP and its purification by metal affinity chromatography. I will use this to generate antibody and assist detection of NP within cells. Furthermore, I am optimising a rescue system, whereby plasmids are transfected into mammalian cells and generate viable virus. This allows you to introduce mutations into the different viral proteins and study the effect of these mutations on the viral lifecycle.

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