Profile
Natsuko Imai
My CV
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Education:
I went to Guildford High School for Girls where I did my GCSEs and A-levels. Then to the University of Edinburgh where I studied Biological Sciences. I did my Masters at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. I studied for my PhD at Imperial College London.
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Qualifications:
11 GCSEs, 3 A levels (Biology, Chemistry, Maths/Statistics), BSc Biological Sciences (Hons Infectious Diseases), MSc in Control of Infectious Diseases, PhD in Infectious Disease Epidemiology.
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Work History:
My first job was working at a dog kennel – that was fun, and loud, and smelly. I worked in a parasite immunology lab during my undergrad. During my PhD I worked as a teaching assistant and tutor. I was then a research assistant researching diseases that mosquitoes transmit like dengue and Zika virus.
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About Me:
Infectious disease epidemiologist. Born in Japan – grew up in the UK. I love to cook and will happily eat (Japanese) rice with every meal.
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Read more
Hi! I’m Natsuko. I was born in Japan but grew up in Norway and the UK. I currently live in -London with my partner who is also a scientist. I studied biology at school and university and initially worked in the lab. But I discovered epidemiology and modelling 8 years ago and now spend my time helping people think about how to control infectious disease outbreaks.
I’ve always loved to read and I’m told one of my secret superpowers is that I can read really really fast! I like to cook to relax and will always cook too much food if we are having guests.
My pronouns are she/her.
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I work on infectious diseases which are diseases that spread from person to person. I work mostly on outbreaks of infectious diseases. This is when there are more cases of an infectious disease in the same place and time than expected. I use a computer to run a “model”, or a simulation, to estimate the “R number” which tells me if the outbreak is getting bigger (R>1) or smaller (R<1). Then I can use the model to estimate how many cases there might be a month later. This helps governments, and international organisations make a plan for how many doctors and how much money they need to care for patients and control the outbreak.
This work can’t be done alone, so I work in a team of anything from 5 to 70(!) people depending on the outbreak. My work also involves lots of people from different organisations and countries so (before Covid) I got to travel to some really exciting places like Colombia and Brazil to meet other scientists, doctors, and public health professionals.
The final and really important aspect of my work is communication. This can be giving talks about my work or writing and publishing papers. My favourite is teaching students and other scientists how to model infectious diseases.
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My Typical Day:
I usually snooze my alarm at least once before I can get out of bed. I usually spend the day working with the outbreak team running computer models, writing reports, and drawing graphs. I talk a lot with people to understand the problem better.
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Every day is different, but my typical day starts with a coffee then a gym class at 7am. I love to exercise before work as it really helps to put me in a good mood. I usually have breakfast while I deal with any emails.
Sometimes there might be urgent requests to analyse new data so I’ll set up a meeting with the outbreak team. We’ll discuss the new information and form an analysis plan. We usually try to work in the same space to make it easy to quickly discuss any problems.
We’ll discuss the results and go back and forth over the analysis until we’re happy. If it’s a really hectic day then we’ll start writing a report with our results at the same time. Once we’re all happy with the final report I’ll send this on to our collaborators.
During an outbreak we have to work quickly and flexibly but it’s always exciting!
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What I'd do with the prize money:
Design and run a workshop for schools where groups have to work together as part of an “outbreak team” to come up with the best plan to control the epidemic!
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My Interview
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How would you describe yourself in 3 words?
Short, curious, organised
What did you want to be after you left school?
A pastry chef
Were you ever in trouble at school?
Only when I didn't do my homework because I thought the assignment was boring!
Who is your favourite singer or band?
I'm currently obsessed with the Hamilton soundtrack
What's your favourite food?
Japanese sticky rice
If you had 3 wishes for yourself what would they be? - be honest!
To work hard to have an "ikigai", to be able to speak French, I also wish that a Covid vaccine becomes available soon for everyone.
Tell us a joke.
What do you call an apology written in dots and dashes? Re-morse code.
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