Intro

Joining us this month is Dr Diana Fusco, lecturer in biological physics here at the Cavendish Laboratory. Diana is an amazing example of what it means to have an interdisciplinary and curiosity-driven career. Her scientific journey started at the University of Milan, where as an undergraduate, she focused mainly on theoretical and statistical physics. For her doctoral studies at Duke University, she took her first big jump and pivoted to computational work in soft matter physics and proteins. After that, she switched gears yet again and embarked on a postdoc in experimental microbiology at Berkeley.

Diana then joined the Department of Physics here at the Cavendish in 2018, where her growing research group now focuses on understanding bacterial biofilms and the coevolution between bacteria and viruses, employing a wide range of tools from microscopy, to theoretical modelling, to computational simulations.

In today’s episode, we’ll ask her about her unusual and adventurous journey through the disciplines, the differences and intersections between theoretical and experimental sciences, and what it’s like to not just find your path, but create it.

Stay with us…

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[00:35] – Guest’s intro

[01:45] – Background and early interest in science

[03:04] – Interest and journey in Biological Physics

[03:49] – Moving to United States for PhD in Computational Biology and academic environment

[08:12] – Motivation behind switching to experimental research and finding post doc opportunity

[11:30] – Different approach towards doing science

[13:21] – Examples of other people who may have followed a similar science research journey

[13:56] – Shift and acceptance towards interdisciplinary science

[15:18] – Experiments during Postdoc – theory of bacterial evolution

[17:47] – In the news this month is the Cosmology experiment based in South Africa – HERA, Hydrogen Epoch of Reionization Array and its impact upon local development. The University of Cambridge is one of the seven international institutions, outside of South Africa, that collaborated on the international project – HERA, Hydrogen Epoch of Reionization Array. HERA is an international astronomy infrastructure, a radio telescope dedicated to observing how the first structures formed in the very early stages of the universe, as the first stars and galaxies lit up space. As per an impact study from SARAO, the University of Cambridge has been involved with the project in multiple ways. This involvement with the project, along with that by other institutions, has made a difference to the local community as well as nationally in South Africa.

[22:08] – Post-doc at Berkley and experience of applying to other senior positions

[24:16] – Decision to take up the Cavendish Opportunity

[26:36] – Moving to Cavendish and starting the research group during the pandemic

[28:11] – About the current group research (two projects) –

• Bio-films and bacteria communities

• Evolution of bacteriophages

[30:40] – Kind of experiments – Evolutionary experiments

[32:45] – Discrepancies in the experiments

[34:30] – More on Bio-films

[36:00] – Research Approach (bottom-up approach )

[37:55] – How is the bottoms-up research approach different from other research approaches?

[39:15] – Future of the research

[41:18] – Outro

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Useful links:

• Visit Biological and Biomedical Physics to understand more about their research.

• Read the article on this month’s news - HERA Project - Impacting local development through employment creation and encouraging participation of researchers in South Africa

• Impact study link for this month’s news release - https://www.sarao.ac.za/media-releases/hera-impact-study/

• To learn more about the Cavendish Laboratory, or if you are interested in joining us or studying with us, go to www.phy.cam.ac.uk

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Episode credits:

Hosts: Paolo Molignini and Simone Eizagirre Barker

News presenter: Jacob Butler

Producer: Chris Brock