Emma Yhnell

Last updated

Emma Yhnell
Dr Emma Yhnell 2020.jpg
Dr Emma Yhnell, 2020
CitizenshipBritish
Alma mater Cardiff University
Scientific career
Fields Behavioural neuroscience
Institutions Cardiff University
Thesis A phenotypic characterisation of the HdhQ111 mouse model of Huntington’s disease  (2015)
Doctoral advisor Stephen Dunnett
Simon Brooks
Website emmayhnell.com

Emma Yhnell is a British scientist, science communicator and senior lecturer based at Cardiff University. [1] She has previously conducted research on computerised cognitive training and Huntington's disease. An advocate for public engagement and science communication, and a STEM ambassador, Yhnell won the British Science Association's Charles Darwin Award Lecture for Agricultural, Biological and Medical Sciences and the British Neuroscience Association's Public Engagement Award.

Contents

She served as Equal Opportunities & Diversity Representative on the British Neuroscience Association Committee. [2]

Early life and education

Yhnell attended Chosen Hill School in Gloucestershire. Yhnell then went to Cardiff University for undergraduate study and graduated with a First Class BSc Hons in Biochemistry. She completed her PhD in Behavioural Neuroscience, which was funded by an MRC studentship, [3] on Behavioural Neuroscience and Huntington's disease. [4]

Yhnell also completed a Postgraduate Certificate in Clinical Trials via distance learning through the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. [5]

Research and career

Following her doctoral studies, Yhnell worked as a post-doctoral researcher for the Brain Repair Group, then the Neuroscience and Mental Health Research Institute, at Cardiff University. [1] She was named a Research Fellow in 2016, and worked as a consultant for Neem Biotechnology. [1]

Yhnell currently works as a Senior Lecturer in the School of Biosciences at Cardiff University. [3] [4] Her research is on Huntington's disease, a rare genetic brain disorder which causes cognitive, motor, and psychiatric problems. [3] She held a Health and Care Research Wales Fellowship to investigate the potential of computerised cognitive training for people with Huntington's disease, [4] translating her findings from her PhD into the clinical setting with patients. [6]

She is a National Teaching Fellow, Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, [7] a British Neuroscience Association former Local Group Representative, [8] and a member of the FENS Communication Committee. [1]

Science communication and public engagement

Yhnell's public engagement work has included speaking at the Hay Festival of Literature & Arts (2018), Soapbox Science (a series of events promoting women working in science) (2018), Cheltenham Science Festival (2019), and Pint of Science (2018) (a festival communicating scientific developments to the general public). [7] In March 2016, Yhnell attended the Westiminster Parliament of the United Kingdom to present on the potential of using games to train the brain, to improve cognition and movement, as part of the national competition SET for Britain. [9] [10] She took part in the Royal Society's Pairing Scheme which aims to bring science to the attention of Parliamentarians and civil servants, she was paired with Kevin Brennan MP. [11] She was a speaker at TEDx Cardiff University in 2017. [12]

She contributed to the book How the Brain Works: The Facts Visually Explained for the publisher Dorling Kindersley (DK), published in March 2020. [13] [14]

Honours and awards

Yhnell won the Biochemical Society's Science Communication Competition in the Written category in 2015. [15] In 2017 she won the Young Investigator Award from the Cardiff Institute of Tissue Engineering and Repair. [16] In the same year she was a finalist for the Womenspire Chwarae Teg Rising Star award. [17]

In 2018, Yhnell was awarded the British Science Association's Charles Darwin Award Lecture for Agricultural, Biological and Medical Sciences. Yhnell gave her award lecture at the British Science Festival in Hull in September 2018, [18] in which she discussed her cutting edge research in Huntington's disease and its challenges, and public and patient involvement in research in using brain-training. [8] She was awarded the British Neuroscience Association's Public Engagement Award in 2018. [19]

In 2019, Yhnell won the Welsh round of the UK Science Communication Competition Famelab [20] and went on to compete at the UK Finals during Cheltenham Science Festival. [21]

Related Research Articles

Angela Vincent is Emeritus professor at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Somerville College, Oxford.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Colin Blakemore</span> British neurobiologist (1944–2022)

Sir Colin Blakemore,, Hon was a British neurobiologist, specialising in vision and the development of the brain. He was Yeung Kin Man Professor of Neuroscience and senior fellow of the Hong Kong Institute for Advanced Study at City University of Hong Kong. He was a distinguished senior fellow in the Institute of Philosophy, School of Advanced Study, University of London and Emeritus Professor of Neuroscience at the University of Oxford and a past Chief Executive of the British Medical Research Council (MRC). He was best known to the public as a communicator of science but also as the target of a long-running animal rights campaign. According to The Observer, he was both "one of the most powerful scientists in the UK" and "a hate figure for the animal rights movement".

Trevor William RobbinsCBE FRS FMedSci is a professor of cognitive neuroscience and the former Head of the Department of Psychology at the University of Cambridge. Robbins interests are in the fields of cognitive neuroscience, behavioural neuroscience and psychopharmacology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ann Graybiel</span> American neuroscientist

Ann Martin Graybiel is an Institute Professor and a faculty member in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is also an investigator at the McGovern Institute for Brain Research. She is an expert on the basal ganglia and the neurophysiology of habit formation, implicit learning, and her work is relevant to Parkinson's disease, Huntington's disease, obsessive–compulsive disorder, substance abuse and other disorders that affect the basal ganglia.

The British Neuroscience Association (BNA) is a scientific society with around 2,500 members. Starting out as an informal gathering of scientists meeting at the Black Horse Public House in London to discuss brain-related topics, on 23 February 1968 it was formerly established as the Brain Research Association, and subsequently relaunched as the British Neuroscience Association in 1997.

Stephen"Steve"Dunnett DSc FMedSci FLSW is a British neuroscientist, and among the most highly cited researchers in the neurosciences. Until his retirement in 2017, he was a professor at Cardiff University and the founder and co-director of the Brain Repair Group, where he worked on developing cell therapies for neurodegenerative diseases including Parkinson's disease and Huntington's disease.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jeff Carroll</span>

Jeffrey Bryan Carroll is an American scientific researcher in the field of Huntington's disease (HD). As a carrier of the abnormal gene that causes HD, he is also a public advocate for families affected by the disease, and co-founder of the HD research news platform HDBuzz. His life and work were the subject of a 2011 Gemini award-nominated CBC documentary feature. Carroll is an Associate Professor of neuroscience in the Department of Biology at the University of Washington

Maiken Nedergaard is a Danish neuroscientist most well known for discovering the glymphatic system. She is a jointly appointed professor in the Departments of Neuroscience and Neurology at the University of Rochester Medical Center. She holds a part-time appointment in the Department of Neurosurgery within the University of Rochester Center for Translational Neuromedicine, where she is the principal investigator of the Division of Glial Disease and Therapeutics laboratory. She is also Professor of Glial Cell Biology at the University of Copenhagen, Center for Translational Neuromedicine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sophie Scott</span> British neuroscientist

Sophie Kerttu Scott is a British neuroscientist and Wellcome Trust Senior Fellow at University College London (UCL). Her research investigates the cognitive neuroscience of voices, speech and laughter particularly speech perception, speech production, vocal emotions and human communication. She also serves as director of UCL's Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tara Spires-Jones</span> Professor of Neurodegeneration

Tara Spires-Jones is professor of neurodegeneration and deputy director of the Centre for Discovery Brain Sciences at the University of Edinburgh.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Karen Holford</span> Welsh professor

Dame Karen Margaret Holford is a Welsh-domiciled engineer, Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Vice-Chancellor and Chief Executive of Cranfield University. She was formerly Deputy Vice-Chancellor at Cardiff University. She is also a former Pro Vice-Chancellor of the College of Physical Sciences and Engineering and Head of the School of Engineering. She is an active researcher of acoustic emission and her work has been applied to damage assessment inspections on industrial components.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">CUBRIC</span> Brain imaging centre in Cardiff, Wales

The Cardiff University Brain Research Imaging Centre (CUBRIC) is a brain imaging centre, part of Cardiff University's Science and Innovation Campus in Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom. When it expanded in 2016, it was considered the most advanced brain imaging centre in Europe.

Jessica Leigh Jones is a Welsh engineer and astrophysicist from Cardiff. She is credited with becoming the first female to win the UK Young Engineer of the Year Award in 2012 for her work designing a portable uterine contraction monitor which cut manufacturing costs by 99%. She was later rewarded for her efforts to commercialise the technology, receiving the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) Intel Inspiration Award for Entrepreneurship in the same year.

Kochupurackal P. Mohanakumar is an Indian chemical biologist, neuroscientist and the director of Inter University Centre for Biomedical Research and Super Specialty Hospital, Kottayam. He is a former chief scientist at the Indian Institute of Chemical Biology and is known for his studies on Parkinson's disease and Huntington's disease. The Department of Biotechnology of the Government of India awarded him the National Bioscience Award for Career Development, one of the highest Indian science awards, for his contributions to biosciences in 2000.

Nihar Ranjan Jana is an Indian neuroscientist and professor at the IIT Kharagpur, known for his studies on E3 ubiquitin ligases, protein homeostasis and neurodegenerative disorders. Jana is an elected fellow of the National Academy of Sciences, India. The Department of Biotechnology of the Government of India awarded him the National Bioscience Award for Career Development, in 2008 and TATA Innovation Fellowship in 2014 for his contributions to Neurodegenerative diseases.

Anirban Basu is an Indian neurobiologist, who is primarily interested in neurovirology, a senior scientist at the National Brain Research Centre, a deemed to be university, located in Manesar, Gurgaon, Haryana. He is internationally known for his studies on Japanese encephalitis. Basu is an elected fellow of all the three major Indian science Academies namely the Indian Academy of Sciences, the Indian National Science Academy and the National Academy of Sciences, India as well as of the West Bengal Academy of Science and Technology. The Department of Biotechnology of the Government of India awarded him the National Bioscience Award for Career Development, one of the prominent Indian science awards, for his contributions to biosciences and biotechnology, in 2010.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hannah Critchlow</span> British neuroscientist (born 1980)

Hannah Marion Critchlow is a British scientist, writer and broadcaster. Her academic research has focused on cellular and molecular neuroscience. In 2014 the Science Council named her as one of the ten leading "communicator scientists" in the UK. In 2019 Nature listed her as one of Cambridge Universities "Rising Stars in Biological Sciences". In 2022 she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Brunel University for her work in neuroscience and communication.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Irene Tracey</span> British neuroscientist (born 1966)

Irene Mary Carmel Tracey is Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford and former Warden of Merton College, Oxford. She is also Professor of Anaesthetic Neuroscience in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences and formerly Pro-Vice-Chancellor at the University of Oxford. She is a co-founder of the Oxford Centre for Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging of the Brain (FMRIB), now the Wellcome Centre for Integrative Neuroimaging. Her team’s research is focused on the neuroscience of pain, specifically pain perception and analgesia as well as how anaesthetics produce altered states of consciousness. Her team uses multidisciplinary approaches including neuroimaging.

Joanna Verran is an Emeritus Professor of Microbiology and Head of Science Communication at Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU). She studies the interaction of microorganisms with inert surfaces. She was awarded the 2019 AAAS Award for Public Engagement with Science.

Jane Haley MBE is a British electrophysiologist who is the Edinburgh Neuroscience Scientific Coordinator at the University of Edinburgh. It was for this role in public engagement and collaboration that Haley was appointed MBE in the 2019 Queen's Birthday Honours List recognising her contribution to science engagement and education.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Office, FENS. "Emma Yhnell". FENS.org. Retrieved 16 August 2020.
  2. "New BNA Equality and Diversity Representative Announced | News | The British Neuroscience Association". www.bna.org.uk. Retrieved 16 August 2020.
  3. 1 2 3 "Emma Yhnell". Cardiff University. Retrieved 10 October 2018.
  4. 1 2 3 "Emma Yhnell". The Conversation. Retrieved 10 October 2018.
  5. "Meet Emma Yhnell | Wonk! Magazine". Wonkmagazine. Retrieved 16 August 2020.
  6. Smith, Mark (11 February 2017). "These Welsh women are at the forefront of scientific innovation". walesonline. Retrieved 11 October 2018.
  7. 1 2 "Emma Yhnell". Welsh Crucible. 23 August 2018. Retrieved 10 October 2018.
  8. 1 2 "Top researchers recognised ahead of British Science Festival". British Science Association. Retrieved 10 October 2018.
  9. "Huntington's Patients May Find Computer Games Help Improve Thinking and Movement - Huntington's Disease News". Huntington's Disease News. 16 March 2016. Retrieved 10 October 2018.
  10. "Brain-training computer games to combat Huntington's disease". Cardiff University. Retrieved 10 October 2018.
  11. "Royal Society Pairing Scheme MP visit". Cardiff University.
  12. "Meet Dr Emma Yhnell, neuroscientist and the new friendly face of science". InterCardiff. 16 January 2019. Retrieved 16 August 2020.
  13. "Dr Emma Yhnell". Neuro Central. Retrieved 16 August 2020.
  14. How the brain works : the facts visually explained (First American ed.). New York, NY: DK Publishing. 10 March 2020. ISBN   978-1-4654-8979-1. OCLC   1105149578.
  15. Bioscience, Biochemical Society | Advancing Molecular. "Previous Science Communication Competition winners". www.biochemistry.org. Retrieved 11 October 2018.
  16. "CITER Annual Scientific Meeting 2017". Cardiff University. Retrieved 10 October 2018.
  17. "Womenspire 2017 Finalists - Chwarae Teg". Chwarae Teg. Retrieved 11 October 2018.
  18. "Cardiff neuroscience researcher wins BSA Award Lecture | News | The British Neuroscience Association". www.bna.org.uk. Retrieved 11 October 2018.
  19. "BNA Prize Winners 2018 Announced! | News | The British Neuroscience Association". www.bna.org.uk. Retrieved 23 April 2019.
  20. "FameLab". Cheltenham Festivals.
  21. "FameLab UK Final 2019". Cheltenham Festivals.