OUR TEAM
TIM DAVIES
PI/Assistant Professor (Joined in 2020)
Tim started running his group at Durham in January 2020 and has worked on cell division since his PhD. He never gets bored of watching cells divide or talking over coffee.
YIMING (BRAN) PENG
CSC PhD student (Joined in October 2024)
Bran was a student at the Huazhong Agricultural University in Wuhan, China for his undergraduate and Masters degrees. His background involved high-content image analysis, cell dynamics and zebrafish development. His PhD project involves making (opto-) genetic tools and using them to study actomyosin and cell biophysics in the early C. elegans embryo.
HESSA ALBASSAM
BBSRC NEEDL PhD student (Joined in October 2025)
Hessa’s PhD project explores how Src signalling regulates cytokinesis in C. elegans and in human cells. She previously did a BSc in Biomedical Science at the University of Sheffield and an MRes in Cell Biology at University College London.
HANNAH CLARKE
Durham DDTF PhD student (Joined in October 2025)
Hannah did an integrated Masters (MBio) in Biochemistry at the University of Warwick working on DNA removal in Auanema nematodes. Her PhD now focuses on how cytokinesis varies between cells in C. elegans.
THOMAS MULLAN
BBSRC funded Postdoctoral Research Associate (Joined in November 2025)
Thomas completed his PhD at UCL in the lab of Richard Poole, studying the interplay between embryonic neuronal fate regulation and asymmetric and unequal division in the C. elegans C lineage. Following a short foray away from nematodes undertaking a postdoc with Chema Martin-Duran at Queen Mary, University of London investigating heterochrony in annelid trunk development, he has returned to C. elegans to investigate the effect of Wnt signalling on cytokinesis of the EMS blastomere.
MADDY CHANDLER
MBiol student (Joined in July 2025)
Maddy is in the final year of her MBiol degree in the Biosciences Department at Durham. She initially joined the Davies lab during the summer of 2025 with a department funded summer studentship. Her project looks at the requirement for cytokinesis proteins in the C. elegans seam cells.
BEN WHYATT
MRes student (started in October 2024)
Ben completed he BSc in Biological Sciences at Durham University in 2024. During this time he undertook a final year research project with Colin Jahoda. He then joined the Davies lab, to investigate actomyosin contractility during cytokinesis in the early C. elegans embryo.
LAB PHOTOS
November 2025
November 2024
November 2023
FORMER MEMBERS
MBiol students
-
Isabel Cormack - 2020-2021
-
Jade Newbury - 2021-2022
-
Rebecca Sandercock - 2021-2022
-
Adam Rogerson - 2022-2023
-
Elisa Lee - 2023-2024
-
Ellie Wu - 2024-2025​
Undergraduate students
-
Robert Almqvist - 2021 Genetics Society Summer Studentship
-
Sam Bennett - 2021
-
Oswald Chan - 2021
-
Adam Rogerson - 2022 Biosciences Summer Studentship
-
Abi Dufeu - 2022
-
Felix Breach - 2023
-
Will Lovell - 2023
-
Yixin Liu - 2024
-
Maddy Chandler - 2025 Biosciences Summer Studentship
-
Will Rathbone - 2025
-
Amy Sewell - 2025