Nicole Moore

Nicole’s study and early work experience gave her lab, research, and analytical skills that she wields in her career as a university researcher overseas.

In high school I knew I wanted to study science at university, although initially I was unsure about which course to choose. After some research I settled on a Biomedical Science degree. The biology focus combined with a broad range of topics including human health, pathology, physiology, microbiology, and genetics was an interesting and exciting combination.

I enjoyed my classes from the beginning, particularly the human genetics elective courses. I broadened out into a double major in Molecular Pathology and Human Genetics as these subjects complemented each other well. Most lecturers were active researchers sharing their knowledge, passion, and expertise from their fields. This made me strive to work hard to not only gain more knowledge but also want the same for myself.

The self-directed learning, research, and project of the Honours year was a new challenge and lot of work. Towards the end of that year I was torn between continuing the natural progression into a Master’s or PhD, as most of my classmates were planning on doing, or taking a break from study and trying to find a job. Fortunately, I was lucky enough to get a job at the Institute of Environmental Science and Research (ESR), first as a research assistant. Eventually I was promoted to a scientist on a pathogen discovery research project. The main aim of this project was to find pathogens, normally viruses, causing unsolved cases of disease in humans or animals. The work was hugely rewarding. This work also progressed into establishing other next generation sequencing work, including the set up and use of different sequencing platforms, such as Illumina MiSeq and Oxford nanopore MinION, across some of the institute’s research and diagnostic work.

Following my time at ESR I moved to the University of Adelaide and worked at the Australian Centre for Ancient DNA for a year on ancient microbiome research. This utilised the skills that I had already developed at Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington and ESR and allowed me to easily apply them to research on how microbes change over time and space. I was further able to develop my leadership skills here and interact with students and had more opportunities to teach when working with graduate students and postdoctoral researchers within our centre. Following the year in Australia I moved to the United States with the same research group to The Pennsylvania State University as a researcher. Here I have helped build laboratories, provided training, and set up the research this group completes on microbial communities over time from around the world, primarily focusing on the oral microbiome. I also provide technical advice to other university labs that wish to use our facilities.

The knowledge from my undergraduate study on human health and pathogens, as well as the research and analytical skills from my postgraduate study have been very relevant and helpful. The skills I have learnt allow me to easily adapt in the research environment that is forever changing with scientific and technological advances. These technological and scientific advances also led to changes in my role at ESR over time and allowed me to be challenged and learn different skills, such as how to run different DNA sequencing devices as well as the early stages of DNA sequence analysis (bioinformatics). These additional experiences have also helped in my most recent roles.

My advice for current and future students would be to gain as much lab experience as you can, especially during your undergraduate years. Whether that be lab demonstrating or volunteering in a lab assisting PhD students with their projects. The experience of volunteering in a lab for over a year allowed me to gain a better understanding of lab techniques in practice, refine my technical skills, learn how to troubleshoot difficult experiments, and gain a more realistic view of what working in a lab every day might be like.