Dr Ruth Taylor
Senior Lecturer
Biography
Ruth is a Senior Lecturer within Chester Medical School, specialising in Neuroscience and teaching on the MBCHB Programme. She is the MBCHB programme Disability Link Tutor, the Programme Leader for the MRes Medical Sciences and the Chester Medical School Postgraduate Research Tutor.
Teaching and Supervision
Ruth is involved in teaching on a range of postgraduate courses at the University of Chester, including the MBChB Graduate Entry Programme and MSc Psychiatry. She is the Block Lead for Year 1 Neuroscience content on the MBChB programme (Block 3: Brain and Behaviour). Ruth's teaching portfolio focuses on neurophysiology and research skills.
Research and Knowledge Exchange
Ruth’s research interests are predominantly focused on how the brain works. To date, she has utilised a variety of quantitative scientific techniques to understand key questions in Neuroscience. Her PhD employed patch clamp electrophysiology to investigate the cell signalling pathways that underlie the modulation of a Calcium activated Potassium conductance that mediates the adaptation of hippocampal neurons to repetitive firing. Her PhD gave a solid grounding in electrophysiology, a technique that was core to her scientific research prior to joining Chester and informs her work as a demonstrator and organiser of the Cell Physiology Workshop. Following her PhD, she undertook 10 years of postdoctoral experience in Neuroscience research at the University of Oxford and King’s College London. During this time, she became increasingly interdisciplinary, with research interests ranging from using a combination of electrophysiological and optical methods to investigate neuroplasticity, single particle tracking to investigate individual receptor motion to the use of human Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells to investigate neural development with reference to Autism Spectrum Conditions. Her postdoctoral years extended her research interests to include optical technologies and began a move from basic science to translational research with a special interest in Autism. Moving to Chester Medical School has further broadened her research lens to include clinical and pedagogical research and focused her research interests on Neurodiversity.