Daniel has 7 years’ experience working on the Caf1 project and has published numerous papers on engineered and native Caf1, as both first and senior author. Working as a post-doctoral researcher in the Lakey laboratory, he has focussed on the design, engineering and characterisation of proteins.

Dan began his career at the University of York, completing his undergraduate degree in Biochemistry before staying on to complete a PhD, investigating the structural biology of protein/RNA complexes. A brief post-doctoral position studying engineered protein nanorods ignited his interest in protein engineering, after which he joined Prof. Jeremy Lakey’s group in Newcastle in 2015

Since 2020 Daniel has combined his academic research with commercialisation training. He has completed the "Future Founders" workshop, the BIA PULSE training programme, and the ICURe programme as an ECR in cohort 35.  The conclusion of his ICURe project was a recommendation by the expert panel that the Caf1 technology should be developed through a spin-our company. This aligns with Daniel’s own strong interest in the commercialisation of research, believing it to be the best way of translating discoveries from the lab bench and into society.

Dr. Waller has over 20 years’ experience in her current role as a Senior Research Technician and Laboratory Manager in the Lakey research group at Newcastle University and over 9 years hands on experience with the Caf1 project. She has been involved in many of their outstanding research projects and is author and co-author on over 40 publications. In her early career Helen worked in industry as a laboratory technician for Lamp Metals Ltd. after which she gained an 1^st Class Honours Degree in Analytical Chemistry followed by a PhD in Biochemistry. Her expertise is in the scalable production and purification of proteins using bacterial fermentation and in recent years she has pioneered a scalable and cost efficient production and purification process for Caf1.