Group Members
We are always looking for new PhD students, Postdocs, and Master students to join the team (see openings) !
People
Aaron Golden
Lab PI. Lecturer 1999-2011 (Computer Science, University of Galway); Assoc. Prof. 2011-2016 (Genomics/Radiation Oncology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine); College Lecturer 2016-2022 (Applied Mathematics/Bioinformatics, University of Galway); Assoc. Prof. 2022- (Physics/Natural Sciences, University of Galway)
email: aaron.golden@universityofgalway.ie
Michael Geever
SFI Postdoc, started January 2023
Michael is working on the application of AI & statistical analytics to earth observation data.
email: michael.geever@universityofgalway.ie
Dúalta Ó Fionnagáin
SFI Postdoc, started January 2023
Dúalta is working on the development of novel AI models to track and characterise the effects of climate change on biomass cycles.
email: dualta.ofionnagain@universityofgalway.ie
Patricia Codyre
Research Associate, started December 2022
Patricia acts as the Programme Manager for the TAPAS project, as well as a font of knowledge as regards working with NGOs, organisations such as the UN, and is also an expert on digital health technologies.
email: patricia.codyre@universityofgalway.ie
Parisa Taheri Foroushani
PhD Student, started Oct 2019
Parisa is studying the radiomics/radiogenomics of lung cancer.
email: P.TaheriForoushani1@universityofgalway.ie
Sumaira Malik
PhD Student, started Oct 2019
Sumaira is studying links between small ncRNAs and immunotherapeutic response in cancer.
email: s.malik3@universityofgalway.ie
Deirdre Ní Chonchubhair
PhD Student, started Oct 2020
Deirdre is studying stellar magnetospheres using radio and optical observational data.
email: d.nichonchubhair1@universityofgalway.ie
Sai Chaitanya Susarla
PhD Student, started Oct 2021
Sai is using radio pulsars to remotely sense the interstellar and interplanetary medium.
email: s.susarla1@universityofgalway.ie
Mick Ryan
PhD Student, started September 2021
Mick is exploring the use of high cadence optical imaging to the study of planetary bodies in our solar system.
email: m.ryan109@universityofgalway.ie
Dr. Brian Woods
ICAT Fellow, started July 2023
Dr. Woods will be working with novel imaging, applied statistical & ML methods to the diagnosis and staging of nonarteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathies.
email: woodsbr@tcd.ie
Jemima O’Farrell
Research Assistant on the TAPAS project, started February 2023
Jemima is rapidly becoming an expert in using Google Earth Engine, ML as applied to earth observation data…
email: jemima.ofarrell@universityofgalway.ie
Dr. Lisa Kiely
ICAT Fellow, to start July 2024
Dr Kiely will be working on combining hyperspectral/3D imaging and clinical biomarkers to diagnose, stage and determine the prognosis of localized scleroderma, otherwise known as Morphea.
email: lkiely@gmail.com
Bachelor Students & Interns
Eoin Disney
School of Natural Sciences (Physics) Summer Intern 2023
Eoin will be analysing SuperDARN observations of recent coronal mass ejection impacts and their associated aurora.
Eva Langan
HRB Summer Scholarship Programme, Summer 2023
Eva will be working with Dr. Sian McGarel (University Hospital Galway) on the genomics of adrenocortical carcinoma.
Elif Adıgüzel
Erasmus+ Internship Programme 2022.
Elif worked on data taken with the I-LOFAR radiotelescope to detect Uranian electrostatic discharges.
Jemima O’Farrell
Final Year Project (School of Physics), 2021-2022.
Jemima worked on methods to analyse data from the Hale Telescope’s CHIMERA high-speed imaging camera.
David O’Callaghan
School of Mathematical & Statistical Sciences Internship Programme, Summer 2021.
David used the I-LOFAR telescope to study the radio emissio from a nearby pulsar.
Alumni
Ross Trearty
2023
Role: Ross worked as a Research Assistant on the TAPAS project
Ross lead the development of statistical models applied to crop yield production.
Contact Ross here
Yared Tessema
2022-2023
Role: Yared worked as a Research Assistant on the TAPAS project
He did a terrific job on studying the impact of climate change on agronomy practises.
Contact Yared here
Katie Pighini
2021-2022
Role: Katie completed a MSc (Res) on the transient optical emission from nearby brown dwarfs
Katie currently works as a data scientist for Plasmabound in Dublin.
Contact Katie here
Robert Ferguson
2021-2022
Role: Robert completed a MSc (Res) on a study of the radio pulsar PSR B0656+14 using the I-LOFAR radiotelescope
Robert currently works as an optical engineer for mBryonics in Galway.
Contact Robert here
Eamon McAndrew
2020-2021
Role: Eamon worked as a Research Assistant funded by the HRB on the application of generative adversarial networks (GANs) in COVID radiology
Eamon will be starting a PhD in long non-coding RNA transcriptomics, part of the Long-reads TRanscriptome European Consortium.
Contact Eamon here
Ben Nolan
2020-2021
Role: Ben completed a MSc thesis on the radiogenomic properties of luminal breast cancers
Ben is currently working as a Data Scientist at Pfizer.
Contact Ben here
Clare Lamont
2020-2021
Role: Clare completed a MSc thesis on a topological data analysis of the colorectal microbiome
Clare now works as a Diagnostic Technologist at Abbott Ireland.
Contact Clare here
Gavin Farrell
2020-2021
Role: Gavin completed a MSc on the biosynthetic gene cluster diversity in the colorectal microbiome
Gavin works as a Technical Officer at ELIXIR Hub, Europe based on the Wellcome Genome Campus in Hinxton, UK.
Contact Gavin here
Luke Heneghan
2020-2021
Role: Luke completed a MSc on the diversity of Connemara kelp biofilm microbiomes
Luke is studying for a PhD at the University of Nebraska.
Contact Luke here
Dr. Salam Dulaimi
2017-2021
Role: Just completed a PhD on the optical properties of late-M and early-L dwarf stars.
Contact Sal here
Donal O’Shea
2019-2020
Role: Donal completed a MSc on the functional association of genome duplications & and autism spectrum disorders
Donal is a PhD candidate in the Centre for Research Training in Genomics Data Sciences/NUI Galway.
Contact Donal here
Aran Casserly
2019-2020
Role: Aran completed a MSc on the development of a pipeline to process microbial microbiome data
Contact Aran here
Ella Lillis Greally
2018-2019
Role: Ella completed a MSc on profiling endogenous retroviral activity in prostate cancers
Contact Ella here
Lydia King
2018-2019
Role: Lydia completed a MSc on karyotype instability within chromosome 11 in breast cancers
Lydia is a PhD candidate in the Centre for Research Training in Genomics Data Sciences/NUI Galway.
Contact Lydia here
Ritasree Sengupta
2018-2019
Role: Ritasree completed a MSc on assessing dysbiosis in the colorectal microbiome
Ritasree is currently a Data Analyst at Natus Medical Incorporated.
Contact Rita here
Brian O’Sullivan
2018-2019
Role: Brian completed a MSc on radiosensitive gene expression profiles in prostate cancer
Brian is currently a PhD candidate at NUI Galway.
Contact Brian here
Tom Huxford
2017-2018
Role: Tom completed a MSc on modeling aptamer-conjugated Au nanoparticle radiosensitization
Tom has vanished!
Dalal AlSultan
2017-2018
Role: Dalal completed a MSc on screening for chemotherapeutic genes in marine fungal genomes
Dalal is a IRC funded PhD candidate at Dublin City University.
Contact Dalal here
Olateju Idowu
2017-2018
Role: Olateju completed a MSc on studying the retroviral transcriptome in prostate cancers
Olateju (‘TJ’) is a PhD candidate at the the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre, Ispra, Italy.
Contact Olateju here
Barry Digby
2017-2018
Role: Barry completed a MSc on a metabolite cluster analysis of thermophilic fungal genomes
Barry is a PhD candidate in the Centre for Research Training in Genomics Data Sciences/NUI Galway.
Contact Barry here
Jack Mc Mahon
2016-2017
Role: Jack completed a MSc on characterising the prostate cancer microbiome
Jack is currently a Data Developer at Sega Europe.
Contact Jack here
Dr. Laura Fahey
2016-2017
Role: Laura completed a MSc on extending codon usage bias to study putative pathogen genes using neural networks
Laura is working as a postdoc at Maynooth University.
Contact Laura here
Dr. Kevin Shieh
2012-2016
Role: Completed a PhD on computational studies of de novo motif discovery in aptamer selections.
Currently Fellow at UC Irvine School of Medicine.
Contact Kevin here
Dr. Pilib Ó Broin
2008-2014
Role: Completed a PhD on a genome-scale study of genetic & epigenetic regulatory mechanisms in neurodevelopmental disorders.
Currently Assistant Professorin Bioinformatics at the University of Galway
Contact Pilib here
Dr. Leon Harding
2008-2012
Role: Completed a PhD on the kinematic properties of several nearby field brown dwarfs and tight binary systems using the GUFI high speed photometer at the Mount Graham International Observatory. Leon leads a team at Northrop Grumman’s Space Systems division
.
Contact Leon here
Dr. Stephen Bourke
2007-2012
Role: Completed a PhD on novel high throughput algorithms applied to interferometric imaging using networks of radio telescopes.
Stephen is a Senior Data Engineer for Overstock Ireland.
Contact Stephen here
Dr. Alan Fergus
2004-2010
Role: Completed a PhD on boundary layer tracer suspension & dynamics by computationally modeling particulates in indoor environments.
Currently a Master Engineer for Cloud RAN.
Contact Alan here
Dr. Gregg Hallinan
2004-2009
Role: Completed a PhD on magnetospheric processes and auroral emission from brown dwarfs and very low mass stars.
Currently Professor of Astronomy at Caltech and Director of the Owens Valley Radio Observatory.
Contact Gregg here
Dr. Andrew McLellan
2006-2008
Role: Completed a MSc on predicting imprinted genes in the mouse genome using neural networks.
Currently Andy is Director of Informatics at Decibel Therapeutics.
Contact Andy here
Dr. Paul Geeleher
2006-2008
Role: Completed a MSc on the design & implementation of a web-based microarray analysis platform.
Currently Assistant Professor, St. Jude’s Research Hospital.
Contact Paul here
Dr. Caoilfhionn Lane
2004-2008
Role: Completed a PhD on a survey of magnetic spot activity on radio transient brown dwarfs.
Currently Software Engineer for Joulica.
Contact Caoilfhionn here
Dr. James Mc Donald
2003-2007
Role: Completed a PhD on novel computational implementation of the Discrete Dipole Approximation for high performance modeling of light scattering off particulates.
Currently Valeo Senior Expert, Valeo Vision Systems.
Contact James here
Dr. Shaun Mahony
2002-2005
Role: Completed a PhD on the development and application of self organising neural networks for biological sequence analysis.
Currently Associate Professor of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, Penn State University
Contact Shaun here
Dr. Padraig O’Connor
1999-2003
Role: Completed a PhD on the emission characteristics of pulsar magnetospheres by inverse-modelling methods.
Currently Principal Performance Engineer at QAD.
Contact Padraig here