Data Champions Search

My background is neuropsychology, and later, computational neuroscience. During my studies, I developed strong skills in applied data science and machine learning, as well as fundamental knowledge of neural computation. Currently, I am based in the Cambridge Centre for Neuropsychiatric Research, where our team is working on biomarker discovery for neuropsychiatric disorders, as well as on developing algorithms for more data-informed diagnostics in mental healthcare.

I'm currently a PhD student in phonetics, also previously trained in economics. The commonality of the two fields is that they both rely on the robust analysis of reliable empirical data to reveal patterns of the world. My current research explores speech data to shed light on the cross-linguistic prosodic system. I'm also interested in making speech data openly accessible to facilitate language preservation and phonetic research.

I am a postdoctoral research associate in the Department of Biochemistry, University of Cambridge in Dr Paula MacGregor’s group. My research focuses on the parasites that cause African trypanosomiasis, a disease with significant burden in sub-Saharan Africa. Specifically, I use proteomics to spatially map the proteomes of African trypanosome species. This work will provide much needed functional insight into the cell biology of these parasites as well as their evolutionary diversification.

Additional areas of expertise:

Proteomics, Microbiology.

Qi received her PhD at the University of California, Los Angeles, where she developed computational methods to study alternative splicing and the evolution of HIV. Later she joined the UCLA Division of Dermatology to help identify the resistance mechanisms of targeted cancer therapies using computational tools. 
    
In 2011 she was awarded the Humboldt Research Fellowship to work in the Division of Theoretical Bioinformatics, and later the Division of Applied Bioinformatics, at the German Cancer Research Centre. There she worked on diverse bioinformatics projects with NGS data, such as studying genome-wide epigenetic regulation of cell differentiation, developing sequencing protocols and detecting somatic mutations from whole-genome sequencing data, as well as data integration and predictive modelling. 
    
Currently, she provides bioinformatics training and support to PhD students and postdoctoral researchers in the lab of Professor Beverley Glover.