Assessment of animal stress, pain and other negative emotional states. This includes development of predominantly behavioural tests and measurements that allow inferences to be made about the negative experiences of animals as a consequence of farm housing and husbandry practices.

Understanding welfare and production implications of the prenatal environment in farm animals. Specific research into the impact of prenatal stress on animal welfare outcomes in pigs. Research into the risk posed, under current commercial farming conditions in the UK, to production and welfare by prenatal stress and suboptimal nutrition across all livestock species.

PhD student (2011-2016) ’A study of the efficacy of an anti-GnRH vaccine as more welfare friendly method of castration for ram lambs’ with Edinburgh University

PhD student (2011-2015) ’Addressing pain at parturition in pigs’ with Edinburgh University

PhD student (2011-2016) ’Identifying barriers to pain mitigation in farm animals’ with Edinburgh University

PhD student (2014-2017) ’Effect of late pregnancy management on behaviour, welfare and calf health in dairy cattle’ with Edinburgh University

PhD student (2013-2017) ’Impact of prenatal and postnatal stress on offspring behaviour and epigenetic regulation of stress axis function in sheep’ with Edinburgh University

Current

2016-2022 RESAS ‘Strategic research programme RD 2.2.8 'Improved husbandry and reduction of painful procedures'

2018-2022 BBSRC BB/S002138/1 ‘EmotiPig, Investigating automatic detection of emotion in biometrically identified pig faces using machine learning’ (£101K)

2021-2024 BB/V001515/1 ‘Operationalising social competence and estimating its genetic and genomic basis to improve the welfare of pigs’ (£558K)

Previous

2017-2018 Zoetis ’The use of intestinal microbiota as a biomarker for swine wellness and performance’ (£110K)

2018-2019 UIF ‘Advancing performance on Scottish beef farms through improving body condition scoring skills’ (£38K)