Profile

Originally from Dumfries in the South West of Scotland I currently live with my fiance in Aberdeen. Outside of work I’m an avid user of Netflix and enjoy the occasional visit to the theatre. I’m a big fan of tennis so become difficult to find every summer when Wimbledon is on. I volunteer with the Institute of Physics and STEMnet to try and engage people of all ages in physics and in particular raise awareness of physicist’s roles in healthcare behind the scenes.

While radiation can be dangerous we have found some really good uses for it such as Nuclear Medicine. We attach radioactive sources (something that gives off radiation) to a wide range of drugs, different drugs are processed by the body in different ways so by following the radiation we can see how the drug is being processed and so can judge if that process is working as it should. For example we inject the patient with a radioactive drug which is filtered by the kidneys and then passes into the bladder. If everything is normal then the drug will go into the kidneys and then come out but if there is a blockage then the drug will go into the kidney and then get stuck which we can see on our images.

We detect where the radiation is by using a device called a gamma camera which essentially takes a picture of all the radiation so areas with more of the radioactive drug show up brighter in the picture and areas with none of the drug are dark. As a physicist I make sure that the gamma camera is working correctly so we can be confident that the picture we get is a good one and determine how to make it better if the picture is bad. I also conduct research on new methods of creating that picture and study what conclusions we can come to from our images

We test our equipment regularly so we spot any problems before we use the camera for patient studies, these tests are quality controls (QC) which together provide our quality assurance (QA). Generally tests involve placing a radioactive source in front of the camera, taking an image and then judging if our image is the same as what we would expect to get. The majority of the time you don’t get an image that is exactly the same but is very close. If the image is close enough to be acceptable we say it is within tolerance. Physicists determine these tolerances by judging how big an effect the thing we are testing will have on the doctor’s decision about the patient.

I also carry out research which can take many different forms. Research is usually about trying to find a solution to a particular problem but some times it is an investigation of an unexpected result. An unexpected result suggests that we don’t fully understand the science and we need to learn more so we conduct research experiments designed to give us more information. If we discover something new then we tell other scientists about it by publishing our work or giving presentations.

Nuclear Medicine often has to just be described to people and I would like to create something that is a bit more visual and hands on. Essentially I’d like to build an anatomical model that includes some tubing so participants in outreach events can inject the model with a coloured liquid where the colour represents our radioactive drug. The liquid would pass around the model and through the heart. As it goes through the heart the colour is taken out of the liquid and left in the heart which represents how our heart scans work where the radioactive drug becomes stuck in the heart muscle that is working. This could be adapted for different exams.