Dr Zeynep Ozturk
Postdoctoral Research Scientist, Nuffield Department of Medicine
Academic profile
About
Dr Zeynep Ozturk is a postdoctoral research scientist at the University of Oxford who works on skin cancer melanoma and neuron interaction by utilizing cell culture techniques and zebrafish animal models.
She received her PhD from the Department of Genetics at the University of Cambridge (UK) carrying out research focused on organisation of axonal endoplasmic reticulum (ER), a neuron within a neuron, in Hereditary spastic paraplegia (HSP), a motor neuron disease, mutants in Drosophila (fruit fly). Dr Ozturk applied gene editing methods to generate mutants and transgenics and did confocal microscopy imaging.
Dr Ozturk has a master’s degree from the Department of Molecular Biology & Genetics & Biotechnology, Istanbul Technical University, Turkey. Her project focused on Notch Signalling Pathway Proteins as Potential Biomarkers for Differentiating Multiple Sclerosis (MS) Clinical Subtypes. She applied immunohistochemistry assay and western blotting to CSF samples of patients to investigate a potential biomarker.
She trained in the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics during her bachelor’s degree at Istanbul University, Turkey, through a program designed heavily on genetics and molecular cell biology, and completed a final year project in the University of Roskilde, Denmark, during an ERASMUS Exchange. Her project focused on Identification of miR-29a targets in mitochondrial DNA in Diabetes.
Expertise
- Skin cancer (melanoma)
- Neurodegenerative diseases (motor neuron diseases)
- Cellular organelle biology
- Fruit flies and zebrafish as research animals
- Genetics
- Cell biology
Selected publications
Media experience
Dr Zeynep Ozturk has experience sharing research online and also works with a startup called Questiony to develop a digital platform for expert and public engagement at any level (see below).
Recent media work
Languages
Turkish, English