Our Research Team
Dr Joana Amaral
Research Associate
Joana is interested in investigating plant responses to their surrounding environment using a multidisciplinary approach, including physiological, biochemical and Omics technologies. She joined Elizabete’s team in 2022 to study strategies to improve photosynthesis for higher yielding crops based on Rubisco regulation by Rubisco activase (CAPITALISE project). She is now working in the Delivering Sustainable Wheat (DSW) project, aiming to understand Rubisco synthesis and degradation and its impact on photosynthetic efficiency and Nitrogen Use Efficiency (NUE) in wheat.
Dr Caty Ashton
Specialist Technician (Biochemistry)
Caty analyses proteins and enzymes which are key to the photosynthesis mechanism, to contribute towards making cowpea and soybean more productive and climate resistant.
Dr Rachel Baxter
Senior Data Technician
Rachel supports data management and research activities in the LEC Rubisco and Plant Biochemistry labs. She aims to promote good data management practices and support R users and manage data generation, storage and organisation for the RIPE project at Lancaster Environment Centre.
Rebecca Effie Biney (Fay)
PhD student (2023 – present)
Fay’s research focus is to identify photosynthetic efficient traits of cowpea to improve its productivity and climate resilience. She is working with Elizabete and Sam.
Prof. Elizabete Carmo-Silva
Professor of Crop Physiology
Elizabete Carmo-Silva is an expert on the regulation of carbon assimilation by Rubisco in crop plants, especially wheat and cowpea. She leads a research team that aims to understand and improve the efficiency of photosynthesis to optimise the sustainability and climate resilience of crop production.
Dr Clayton Dilks
Research Associate
Clay is a protein engineer with experience in expression, assay development, and machine learning models to improve protein function. He is focused on engineering crop enzymes to increase photosynthetic rates in our changing climate.
Maria Fernandes Pinheiro
PhD Student (2025 – present)
I am interested and have a background in molecular plant science with an MSci in Molecular and cellular biology (with biotechnology) from the University of Glasgow. I am excited by research with potential downstream biotechnological applications with the ultimate goal of improving crops for increased global food security. My PhD project consists of investigating the role and synthesis pathway for Rubisco inhibitor CA1P. I hope to elucidate key enzymes that play a part in CA1P formation and to also understand why this inhibitor is synthesised. In doing so, I hope to expand on the pool of current Rubisco regulation knowledge.
Dr Armida Gjindali
Research Associate
Armida is a postdoctoral researcher focusing on Rubisco activase (Rca) as part of the RIPE project. Her work aims to understand the mechanism of Rca thermal sensitivity and produce variants with improved Rca thermotolerance and ultimately increased productivity.
Álvaro Herrera Seller
PhD student (2023 – present)
Alvaro is researching the engineering of a plant-based carboxysome in order to increase the local concentration of carbon around Rubisco, enhance the carbon fixation rate, with the aim of improving plant growth. His project is funded by LEC working with Doug and Marj.
Dr Carmen Hermida Carrera
MSCA Postdoctoral Fellow – Horizon Guarantee
Carmen is a plant physiologist currently working on her Marie Curie project LEMSAIP, which focuses on how leaf epidermis development in Arabidopsis connects with the mesophyll and influences photosynthetic performance.
Zuzanna Kaminska
PhD student (2024 – present)
Anna is working on engineering improved thermotolerance for Rubisco’s helper protein, the molecular chaperone Rubisco Activase. Her project is funded by NorthWestBio DTP working with Elizabete, Drew Thomson (Glasgow), and Brian Smith (Glasgow).
Julia Monserrat Relano
PhD student (2023 – present)
Julia is dedicated to explore the potential of bacterial microcompartments as innovative platforms for sustainable biotechnology, with the goal of utilising those microcompartments to develop biofactories. Her project is funded by NorthWestBio DTP working with Doug and Leighton Pritchard (University of Strathclyde).
Connor Nehls-Ramos
PhD student (2023 – present)
Connor is investigating the understudied mechanisms of Rubisco regulation by sugar phosphate inhibitors and the enzymes that degrade them. This work provides further understanding of the intricacies of chloroplastic regulation, informing future improvements in crop yield. He is part of the RIPE project, supervised by Elizabete and Doug.
Dr. Doug Orr
Assistant Professor in Plant Biotechnology
Doug’s interests are in plant biochemistry and synthetic biology. He leads a research group that has 2 major areas: understanding key biochemical aspects of carbon assimilation by Rubisco; and using bacterial microcompartments in plants to either improve photosynthetic efficiency or make use of plants as molecular farming platforms.
Dr Rhiannon Page
Specialist Technician (Molecular Biology)
Rhiannon’s research aim is to develop crop plants that will deliver higher yields and contribute to global food security. She is testing new approaches to improve photosynthetic efficiency.
Dr Emma Raven
Research Associate
Emma is working as part of the RIPE project to develop crops with higher yields through improvements in photosynthetic efficiency. Her crops of focus are cowpea and soybean.
Dr Ingrid Robertson
Specialist Technician (Plant Physiology)
Ingrid is a plant physiologist research technician. She is measuring cowpea’s physiological responses to light and shade as a means to increase the photosynthetic efficiency of this important crop for Sub-Saharan Africa.
Lisa Stout
Lab Technician
Lisa is our lab technician, ensuring the lab runs smoothly and assisting with a (growing!) list of tasks to help us do great science.
Dr Felix Townsend
Research Associate
Felix, who has recently joined Doug’s group, is a Molecular and Structural biologist. He will be using a targeted mutagenesis approach in hope to increase the efficiency of Rubisco in vitro and in planta. This research aims to increase photosynthetic efficiency for more productive crop species.
Dr Dawn Worrall
Research Associate, Research Assistant
Dawn has worked in the Photosynthesis team since 2016 and helped underpin diverse research projects. She uses her expertise in molecular biology, protein purification and electron microscopy to try and understand more about photosynthesis.
Haixia Yu
PhD studnet (2023 – present)
Haixia’s research focus is the connection between Rubisco and leaf hydraulic limitations on photosynthesis of crop plants under abiotic stress, to understand the complex mechanism of plant physiology of crop plants. Her project is funded by LEC and China scholarship Council, supervised by Sam and Elizabete.