Early Career Researchers’ meeting 19 November 2025

Shiv Bhakta is funded by a joint award from the British Geriatrics Society and the Vivensa Foundation for a doctoral training fellowship, at the Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Cambridge. He also works in the Geriatrics and Stroke Departments at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge as an Honorary Specialist Registrar, and promotes Stroke physician training through a Stroke Training Excellence Programme fellowship with the British and Irish Association of Stroke Physicians. He will talk about his doctoral work on calcification, ageing and vascular imaging in the assessment risk of stroke.

Elsa Greed is a PhD student who is part of a cohort funded under the Vivensa Foundation multiple PhD studentship scheme at the University of Birmingham, studying how ageing affects the neuromuscular system. Elsa uses caffeine both as a potential intervention and as a tool to understand how brain-muscle communication changes with age, with the aim of supporting strength and independence in later life.

Dan Hayman studied Genetics at the University of Sheffield for his undergraduate degree, before moving to Newcastle to undertake an MRes and subsequently a PhD in musculoskeletal ageing, focusing on the genetics of bone cells and how this changes as we age. After completion of his PhD, Dan moved to the lab of Dr Evans at the University of Sheffield as a Research Assistant and investigated the genetics of immune ageing using fruit flies as a model organism, funded by the Vivensa Foundation. He then moved to the lab of Dr Simons, also at Sheffield, and investigated nutrition in ageing, specifically molecules we wouldn’t usually think of as nutrients, like RNA, before successfully applying for the first round of the Vivensa Foundation ECR Fellowships scheme and investigating the role of splicing in healthy ageing.

Bethan is a second-year PhD student at the University of Leicester. She holds a BSc in Dance Science and Performance and an MSc in Psychology, which underpins her research on developing physical activity interventions for older people in mental health inpatient units. For the past three years, she has worked as a Research Assistant with Dr Lucy Beishon on the ImPreSs-Care study at Age UK Leicester Shire and Rutland and the University of Leicester. This project grant is funded by the Vivensa Foundation and focuses on improving access to physical health care for older people in mental health settings. Bethan will be sharing insights from this work today.

Keir Young is a neuropsychologist and a Vivensa Foundation Senior Research Fellow at the Dementia Research Centre, University College London. He is chief investigator of the UCL longitudinal study of posterior cortical atrophy (also known as PCA), as well as the International Society to Advance Alzheimer’s Research and Treatment Atypical AD Chair and PCA Working Group Chair. His research has investigated how visual perception, spatial orientation and coordinated movements may be altered by neurodegenerative disease and what this means for diagnosis and management.

The principles set out in our strategic framework are central to everything we fund and support. This session was designed to give the chance to hear from several of our awardees who are doing outstanding work in putting these principles into practice. Hear from Bibhusha Karki (University of Manchester) discuss engagement with underserved communities, advancing equity, diversity and inclusion, from Genna Abdullah (University of Liverpool talk about the work to strengthening patient, carer and public involvement, learn from Claire Hill (Queen’s University Belfast) how to embed environmental sustainability into research and how Helen Nutall (Lancaster University)promotes good research culture and communication.