I was always very academic at school and enjoyed maths and sciences. My mum trained as a paediatric nurse at Great Ormond Street Hospital, so that sparked a fascination with medicine and I was keen to explore a career down that route.
At the same time, I also loved singing and playing the piano and every Saturday, I attended classes at Trinity College of Music in London. By the time it came to choosing what to study for A-levels, I was convinced I wanted to study music and go on to a career as an opera singer. I dropped the idea of going down a scientific route, choosing music, English literature and drama instead, along with biology because I found it interesting.
My main focus was getting a place at music college and after several auditions, I chose to study vocal performance at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. However, three months into my Bachelor of Music, it just didn’t feel right and I was missing studying something more academic. Socially, I also didn’t feel settled. I knew that becoming a professional opera singer would be extremely difficult. Unfortunately, opera is a somewhat dying art and I knew that I would have to make a huge amount of sacrifices to succeed. I loved singing, but I just didn’t feel that I loved it enough to make the sacrifices required.
Video: Schubert and Alma Mahler sung by Jessica May Hislop
From opera to astrophysics
It was during this time that I started watching various Brian Cox documentaries and these sparked an interest in astrophysics. Physics had never been of particular interest to me at school, but I recognised that the current research in physics was quite different to what we were taught and I felt that I would really enjoy it. My family, while supportive, were somewhat confused by my decision, as biology was always the science I had shown the most interest in before. However, I was sure that physics was the right subject for me. In many ways, music and maths are quite similar – and physics is essentially applied maths. People with musical minds often have brains that are very maths-orientated, so I had some confidence in my decision to make the switch. But I definitely wasn’t certain it would work out as it did.
I had only studied maths and physics to GCSE level at school and I did not have the correct A-levels to be considered for a physics degree. However, I found a foundation course at the University of Sussex and was thankfully accepted to start there the following September.
Going into my bachelors, I was a little bit older than most of the students on my course and the majority of my fellow students had studied maths or physics before. It was definitely difficult at times, but I found a real love for physics. Like music, physics is full of rules, but they are really elegant and I found a lot of beauty in the subject. After such a big change, I did somewhat feel that I had something to prove as well, which gave me extra motivation to work hard. By the end of the year, I had done well enough to earn a place on an integrated masters course with paid research placements every summer.
During my placements and for my masters, my research focus was on models of galaxy formation. I continued in this area of work afterwards, moving to Munich in Germany, to study for a PhD in physics with astrophysics at the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics. I was doing theoretical and computational work, creating simulations of galaxies in order to further our understanding of how stars form within galaxies. The computational side of this work relates closely to my current work at the ICR.
Considering a career in cancer research
During my time at university and during my PhD, I met a lot of extremely inspiring and supportive people. The most profound impact on me came from my undergraduate research and master thesis supervisor. He taught me a lot about research. He was also one of the healthiest people I knew, so when he was diagnosed with cancer, it really affected me. He was a huge influence on me in terms of my work and he has certainly been in my thoughts now that I have moved into the field of cancer research.
In 2022, I moved to the University of Helsinki in Finland to take up a three-year position as a postdoc in astrophysics in the Theoretical Extragalactic research group. However, after 18 months, I realised this was not the right fit for me. I felt a pull to move back to the UK to be closer to family and friends, but I knew this would have to be accompanied by a career change. When thinking about what I wanted to do next, I knew that something that would make me feel really fulfilled would be a career where I would be able to use all of my experience and knowledge but was more medicine-based.
Astrophysics is abstract and it allows you to escape in some ways, but it does not directly help people. I felt I wanted to contribute to something that makes a difference to people’s lives. When searching for jobs, I remember reading one of the ICR’s six core values, where it states ‘We all play our part, doing a little bit more, a little bit better, to help improve the lives of people with cancer’, and I thought that’s exactly what I want to be part of.
In my own life, I have been affected by cancer. My dad was diagnosed with skin cancer and passed away whilst my mother was pregnant with me. My mum was also diagnosed with throat cancer. She was treated with radiotherapy over a six-week period and this was successful. I found it amazing to see someone diagnosed with cancer and for it to be totally gone within a few weeks of treatment. Over the years, I also lost three of my four grandparents to cancer and more recently, my supervisor at the University of Sussex. I know the impact that cancer has on so many people on a daily basis, so when the opportunity for this position came up at the ICR, I knew that this could be the right job for me.
Starting work at the ICR was difficult at first. In my previous work, I was used to dealing with very abstract data, based on the distributions and movement of stars in simulations of galaxies. Now I was dealing with datafiles that triggered a more emotional response: they represented thousands of cancer patients, many of whom had passed away. It took me a while to get used to this, but it definitely gets easier over time. The scientific problems and questions now dominate my focus.
Cancer is a very complex problem and will always be relevant
When I step back and think about my work, I’m glad to be making a difference, contributing to something much bigger than me and making the lives of people living with cancer better. I find my work extremely interesting and fulfilling. Cancer is a very complex problem – it will always be relevant. From a scientific perspective, the elements of challenge and problem-solving involved are extremely appealing to me.
As for my music, I am sadly doing less of it these days. I miss it a lot and would definitely like to have that part of my life back. It has been hard to find enough time to commit to being involved in a choir in recent years and having a piano in a small London flat has not been practical. I still enjoy singing my way through long car journeys and hope to get back to music eventually and maybe even merge the scientific side of my life with my musical side.
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