Dr Alex Knight (National Physical Laboratory)
"When seeing isn’t believing: data analysis in super-resolution microscopy"
Biography:
Alex received his BSc in Biochemistry from the University of Kent at Canterbury in 1990. He then moved to the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, where his PhD research focussed on the molecular biology and biochemistry of myosin molecular motors in plants and animals. After receiving his PhD from the University of Cambridge in 1994, he moved to the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research in Cambridge, MA, USA as an EMBO postdoctoral fellow and began an enduring fascination with single molecule biophysics. In 1996 he moved back to the UK and the laboratory of Justin Molloy at the University of York, where he built optical tweezers and single-molecule fluorescence imaging systems to study myosins (again). In 2002, he moved to NPL where he was involved in setting up the new Biotechnology group, becoming a Principal Research Scientist in 2009.
Work at NPL has covered a wide range, including biopharmaceutical quality control, biometrology, circular dichroism, and point-of-care diagnostics, and is currently focussed on advanced microscopy techniques, including particularly super-resolution (SIM and STORM) and adaptive optics. He is an IUPAC fellow and rapporteur for the CCQM’s Bioanalysis Working Group.