Profile – Subject Knowledge

The most exciting thing that's happened this year in my research area:

People have found that the shape of the eye seems to change in people with several brain based conditions such as Alzheimers and Dementia. This is super interesting as it means something in the disease is effecting both the brain and the eye. This could help scientists find new types of treatment for the disease, or help them be able to diagnose it earlier.
My latest work:

I’m trying to use images of the human eye to get measurements about the retina, and then see if genetics is effecting these measurements. The eye measurements tell us about the shape of the eye, and the shape of the eye is effected by several diseases, such as glaucoma. So by looking for genetics that is effecting the shape of the eye, we hope to find genetics to do with these diseases. This may help us find ways to improve how we diagnose and treat these diseases.
My favourite misconception about my area of science:

That coding isn’t creative! Coding requires lots of thinking about new and unique ways to solve problems, it’s basically just a big puzzle to solve. Therefore it’s not just those that are traditionally good at math and science, your typical “nerd”, who can be good at and enjoy coding. It takes lots of different skills and lots of different people use code to solve different problems!

Hannah Currant