Profile
Gabriela da Silva Xavier
My CV
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Education:
I attended SRL English Secondary School in Macau, where I got my O-levels. I then did a pre-university year at the University of Macau to try to ascertain if I wanted to learn computer programming (which was getting big at the time). I did not so I came to the U.K. to do my A-levels at East Sussex College Lewes (current name). I then attended the University of Bristol where I got my BSc and PhD in Biochemistry. Recently I did a part-time MEd at Imperial College London.
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Qualifications:
I did O-levels in a range of subjects (my favourite being English Literature), and A-levels in Biology, Chemistry and Maths, BSc and PhD in Biochemistry, and MEd in University Learning and Teaching.
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Work History:
My first two jobs were as a post-doctoral researcher after my PhD, then I got funding to fund my work as a research fellow. I was appointed Lecturer in 2009 at Imperial College London and have been Senior Lecturer at the University of Birmingham since 2018.
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Current Job:
Senior Lecturer in Cellular Metabolism
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About Me:
I am a scientist and I am interested in how our bodies control energy balance. I am a runner, volleyball player and rock climber. I am a mum and a wife.
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Read more
I’m a scientist working at the University of Birmingham. My job title is Senior Lecturer which means that I teach and perform research. I was born in Macau, which was a Portuguese colony near Hong Kong. I had wanted to be a scientist for as long as I can remember but there were very limited opportunities to do this seriously at home so I came to the U.K. to complete my studies. I attended the University of Bristol, where I studied Biochemistry (on excellent advice from my A-level biology teacher). I enjoyed being in Bristol so much that I stayed on to do my PhD where I studied how the cells that make insulin work. I was/am fascinated by how energy production and balance are core to normal bodily function, and this is the theme of my research work to this day. After 10 years of studying and working in Bristol, I moved to London to work at Imperial College London as a Lecturer. I also became a student again, studying for a part time Master degree in University Learning and Teaching at Imperial College London. It was a natural path in my learning journey as part of my job is to teach, and whilst I had received a lot of training in research, I was relatively uneducated in education. I moved to the University of Birmingham after 12 happy years in London, where I am now working within an institute that is filled with people with similar research interests to me, and where I am very much looking forward to new scientific adventures.
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I teach on various courses at the University of Birmingham. These are usually lecture-based, i.e. I stand at the front of a large room and talk about a subject on which I am an expert and that the students need to know about, for about 45 minutes. It is not as boring as it may sound as I try to make it interactive by incorporating activities for the students that will help them with their learning. I also teach in smaller groups where we can discuss specific topics in more detail, and set and mark student assessments. I am also an external examiner for one of the courses at Kings College London, which means I look through their curriculum and exam papers as part of the quality assurance procedure for the award of university degrees. I also have responsibilities for quality assurance for post-graduate degrees in the medical school at the University of Birmingham.
An important part of my teaching and my research is teaching students in the lab. The idea is that we investigate a scientific problem together- the students learn how to conduct research and I get an extra pair of hands to help me in the lab. Science requires team work and I love the collegiate atmosphere in a well-run research lab/department. When I am not teaching, I would be performing experiments in the lab, or I would be analysing and thinking about the observations and data that I and my team have collected from doing experiments in the laboratory, putting these in context of what we know, formulating the next research question/hypothesis that we could test in the lab, or applying for research money to do the work. I would also be reading about the latest scientific findings in my area of interest, and chatting to colleagues about their work, collaborating with them on their projects if I can help (or asking them for help if they have expertise that would help me answer some of my questions). Once in a while I travel to attend scientific conferences where I speak about my work, listen to what others have done, and participate in discussions with the aim to advance scientific understanding.
As a scientist I communicate my work by publishing my findings in scientific journals. Part of a scientist’s duty, as a member of the larger scientific community, is to look at other scientist’s work before publication to ensure that the findings are scientifically sound and of a suitable quality to be released widely to the scientific community and general public; this is part of my job. I also look at applications for money to perform research work by fellow scientists, and provide my opinion to help charities, research councils, etc. decide if there is enough scientific evidence and good project planning to ensure that the money (should they decide to give it) will be put to good use.
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My Typical Day:
Most of my waking hours on a weekday are spent at the university.
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My cat wakes me up at 6 a.m. in the morning for breakfast. After I have fed Master Cat, I prepare breakfast and packed lunches for me and my son. I have breakfast with my son, drop him off at school and head to work. I am in the lab performing experiments (either myself, or with students), or in my office preparing teaching material, writing up my findings for publication or for presentation at a conference, writing a grant application to get funding for research, having meetings with other scientists or with students to discuss their findings, or reading newly published work from other scientists, or engaged in teaching activities by 9:00/9:30 in the morning. Most days I take lunch while working at my desk, but once a week I will go for a yoga class or go swimming at the university’s sports center at lunch time. I normally leave work at about 17:00, have dinner with the family to catch up on their day, then do a little more work (normally reviewing papers and grant applications, or writing my own papers and grant applications), and then go to bed. Typically I try to do as much work as possible during the working week and keep the weekends free, but that is occasionally not possible. However, I can work flexible hours so I can make up for any extra work time by taking time off at other times.
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What I'd do with the prize money:
Set up simple science experiments that primary school children can do.
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The most exciting thing that's happened this year in my research area:
Our society is increasingly turning into a 24 h society and recent data indicate that we spend more of the day eating. One hypothesis is that this longer feeding window (or shorter fasting window) may contribute to the rise in obesity and metabolic diseases. Recently a study demonstrated that restricting eating to a 10 hour period per day could lead to better health outcomes. In the study, the participants were not told to restrict their eating; in fact they were told they could eat whatever they wanted as long as they restricted eating to a 10 hour period of their choosing. The researchers found that the participants ate less anyway but that there were also other metabolic health benefits. More studies are needed to find out how exactly this eating regiment leads to the healthier outcomes. On the face of it, these data seem to indicate that this relatively simple change in behaviour can bring some benefit.
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My latest work:
I work on proteins that control energy balance- fuel sensors, if you like- and one of the proteins that I work on seems to be regulating energy balance by its action in different parts of the body. For example, we have shown that this protein controls the work of the cells in the pancreas that regulate glucose balance and that people with type 2 diabetes have lowered levels of this protein in these cells. Recently, I found that mice that lack this fuel sensor eat more, and they eat more at the wrong time of day, suggesting that this protein is important in regulating appetite and responses to hunger. I am currently trying to figure out how this protein is doing this.
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My favourite misconception about my area of science:
Many people think that we can decrease obesity by instilling a better sense of self-control in obese individuals. Increasingly the scientific evidence indicates that there is a level of inherent programming through our genetic makeup that could make it difficult for some people to maintain a healthy weight. I don’t mean to say that healthy eating is not important but I am saying that just telling people they need to control their appetites isn’t necessarily helpful.