Profile

I am 22 years old and I was born in Athens, Greece! I moved to Scotland after high-school to do my undergrad in Evolutionary Biology at the University of Edinburgh. I have now moved to Glasgow to do a PhD in Virology.

I enjoy good food, play the keyboard and I am a big Pokemon fan!

One would imagine a virologist being in a lab all day. On the contrary, I spend all my day in front of a computer screen! I use data to better understand the differences between viruses and  how the viruses evolve.

Just like every living organism (including ourselves), each virus has a genome. You can think of a virus genome as a book describing everything about this virus; what it looks like, what it can do and how it can do it. I look at the genomes of different viruses for differences and similarities between them. In this way I can understand how changes in viruses like HIV or the recent SARS-CoV-2 (the virus causing COVID-19) can allow them to infect us.

After I wake up I have a good breakfast to keep me going throughout the day. When I arrive at the research centre I say hi to everyone in the office, turn on my computer and make a big cup of coffee.

I usually spend half my day writing code and looking at data. Being a scientists is all about learning new things, so I spend a lot of my time looking up new ways of analysing my data and improving my code (Google can often be my best friend!). When I get stuck with coding I like to sketch out my ideas on the large whiteboard next to my desk (just like an old-fashioned scientist).

The other half of my day is spent chatting to other scientists about our work. Science is all about new ideas and knowledge! I always like getting feedback on my work from others as well as learning what my colleagues are doing, so I can apply their methods on my work!