If you have no experience of research, you can find more information in our questions and answers section. Our work is mainly experimentally based laboratory research. This means that most people spend the majority of their time planning and executing experiments.
Over the lab as a whole, we use a wide range of techniques including tissue culture, histochemistry, flow cytometry, molecular cloning and protein expression, chromatin immunoprecipitation and quantitative assays of the products of cell activation.
We meet regularly to discuss the results of these experiments, both informally in small groups and at lab meetings, which we hold weekly in the School of Medical Sciences.
About once a term the laboratory meets for a whole morning or afternoon away from the lab, to focus on intermediate and long term planning. At these meetings, lab members have to present their work in a wider context and formulate realistic goals for their projects. We review how well previous goals have been achieved and where they have not been, try to address any problems which may have prevented success.
Occasionally, we invite scientists from other universities to come to spend the day with us, going over the work we are doing and offering advice. It is always useful to have discussions with people who look at your work from a different viewpoint.
Most members of the lab travel to meetings at least once a year (both in the UK and abroad), where they present their work in the form of posters or oral presentations.