Professor Laura Harkness-Brennan PhD MPhys PGCert MInstP FHEA

I lead the national cancer diagnosis research network+, funded through the UKRI-STFC 21st Century Challenges scheme, which launched in Liverpool September 2019. I chair the multi-disciplinary leadership team drawn from the Institute of Cancer Research, King’s college London, Univeristy of Glasgow, University of Leicester, Clatterbridge Cancer Centre, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Guy and St Thomas’s NHS Foundation Trust. I have established a multidisciplinary community with academic, clinical and industry stakeholders to address clinical challenges in the diagnosis of cancer. Membership is drawn from across 50 universities, companies and hospitals. The network has hosted multidisciplinary challenge-led workshops to engage key stakeholders and provide funding for scoping studies and proof of concept projects to translate STFC innovations into clinical impact. The research capacity of early career researchers (ECRs) has been developed through travel awards, placements and training. The Network+ has enabled the STFC and wider community to bid for further funding from UKRI, Innovate UK, Official Development Assistance (GCRF and Newton) and the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund (ISCF). The long-term objectives are to improve patient quality of life, increase survival and reduce associated cancer services costs.

I am an internationally recognised expert in gamma-ray imaging using Compton camera systems. I apply expertise in advanced digital pulse processing, algorithm development, Monte-Carlo modelling and image reconstruction techniques to maximise the efficacy of the systems for nuclear industry applications. I also currently lead a research programme to improve the performance of the radiation detectors used within Low Dose MBI, which is a new method of identifying breast cancer in screening. This will be particularly beneficial for patients who have dense breast tissue, for which mammography has known limitations.

I am a Co-I of the Nuclear Physics Consoldiated Grant, for which my contribution is to exploring the limits of nuclear existence for heavy proton-rich nuclei. I have actively contributed to this experimental programme since 2014, in the commissioning of the Advanced Implantation Detector Array (AIDA) at RIKEN for beta decay studies. To exploit AIDA in future beta decay studies, I led the development of a novel segmented germanium detector to precisely correlate gamma and beta decays of exotic nuclei, funded by a £566k grant from STFC. . I supported the experimental campaign at the ISOLDE Decay Station [IDS] and led the commissioning and first use of a BEGe detector in beta decay studies of odd-mass isotopes, at ISOLDE. Since 2015, I have been coordinator of the Pulse Shape Analysis (PSA) working group for the Advanced Gamma Tracking Array (AGATA), which is a collaborative effort of over 350 physicists from 43 Institutions across Europe to build the ultimate gamma-ray spectrometer for nuclear structure physics experiments. I am also one of the 5 work package leaders in the UK funded AGATA programme (Liverpool funding £824k), supervising a PDRA and PhD student to develop state of the art digital signal processing and detector characterisation techniques.

In 2016, I joined the international collaboration of the Fermilab Mu2e experiment, which will probe properties of the muon to elucidate physics beyond the standard model at the scales being investigated at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in CERN. I was awarded £228k funding in 2017 from STFC to contribute to an essential part of the experiment, which is the development of the Stopping Target Monitor (STM). This is in collaboration with UCL (lead institute) and University of Manchester, I am PI for Liverpool. The STM will be used to provide normalisation for all measurements and is therefore an important system for Mu2e. I specified the design of the STM germanium detectors using Monte-Carlo studies and was a co-spokesperson of a radiation damage study at HZDR Dresden. At Fermialb they will be used to extend the search for charged lepton flavour violation during the experimental campaign. Mu2e collaboration is drawn from across many institutes and countries and the experiment will take place in Chicago, USA.

2013-2016: Amina Patel, 1st supervisor, EPSRC
2014-2019: Kevin Tree, 1st supervisor, EPSRC NGN CDT
2015-2019: Lucy McAreavey, 1st supervisor, STFC
2015-2019: Adam Caffrey, 1st supervisor, STFC CASE
2015-2020: Ellis Rintoul, 2nd supervisor, EPSRC NGN CDT
2016-2021: Fiona Pearce, 1st supervisor, GTA
2017-2021 Jacob Heery, 2nd supervisor, STFC
2017-2022: Fraser Holloway, 1st supervisor, STFC LIV.DAT CDT
2017-2023: Olivia Voyce, 1st supervisor, EPSRC NGN CDT
2017-2022: Hamed Alshammari, 1st supervisor
2018-2022: Sarah Kalantan, 2nd supervisor
2018-2024: Hannah Brown, 1st supervisor, STFC
2018-present: Shiyamjith Nathaniel, 2nd supervisor, STFC LIV.DAT CDT
2020-present: Ahmed Alharbi, 1st supervisor
2020-present: Owain Griffiths, 1st supervisor, EPSRC GREEN CDT
2021-present: Christopher Everett, 2nd supervisor, STFC
2023-present: Nawaf Altasan, 1st supervisor