Fleming Showcase five-minute thesis profile: Charlene Rodrigues
21 October 2020
In celebration of the Microbiology Society’s 75th anniversary, 'Why Microbiologists Matter: a digital celebration of the journeys of our members’ will include a Fleming Showcase. Last year, we launched a call for abstracts from final-year PhD students (and those within one year of completion) to take part in a series of five-minute thesis slots at our Fleming Showcase event. This week we learn more about Charlene Rodrigues from the University of Oxford, UK.
Our Fleming Prize, named after founding member and first President of the Society, Sir Alexander Fleming FRS, is awarded each year to an early career researcher who has achieved an outstanding research record within 12 years of being awarded their PhD.
The Fleming Showcase will be a celebration of outstanding science in recognition of the legacy of past Fleming Prize winners and will demonstrate the impact of both established and up-and-coming scientists in addressing important challenges. The day is organised by a committee of Fleming Prize Winners, chaired by Sir Paul Nurse FRS and will take place between Monday 23 afternoon and all day Tuesday 24 November 2020.
Charlene Rodrigues
Charlene is a clinician specialising in paediatric infectious diseases. She undertook a Wellcome Trust funded DPhil at the University of Oxford in 2015, in genomic epidemiology of meningococcal vaccine antigens in the UK and Ireland, using the Meningitis Research Foundation Meningococcal Genome Library. Her research looked at developing genomic tools to catalogue the diversity and distribution of protein-based meningococcal vaccine antigens, providing methods to perform genomic surveillance and bacterial coverage of meningococcal vaccines and vaccine antigen discovery for the closely related gonococcus.
“Harnessing genomic data to prospectively benefit patients, by improving health and minimising disease.”
Charlene graduated from Leicester Medical School in 2007, having also completed an Intercalated BSc in breast cancer pathology. On completion of the Academic Foundation Programme, she entered paediatric training in London as a National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Academic Clinical Fellow at Imperial College London. It was here that she developed an interest in meningococcal disease and the genomics of host and pathogen. She completed core registrar training in London and obtained a GRID sub-specialty Infectious Diseases, Immunology and Allergy training post in Newcastle upon Tyne in September 2014.
Following her DPhil, she had a renewed interest in microbiology, so trained for six months in adult infectious diseases and microbiology at St George’s Hospital, London. Charlene currently works as a postdoctoral research scientist in Oxford, working to integrate genomics into clinical practice and as a Paediatric Infectious Diseases Consultant at St George’s Hospital, London.
We asked Charlene what presenting at the Fleming Showcase event meant to her:“This wonderful opportunity from the Microbiology Society allows me to share the findings of my DPhil research and share my excitement of how I see microbial genomics contributing to our day-to-day clinical decision making, with examples from the NHS in Scotland.”
Find out more about the Fleming Showcase event and register your place on our website.
