Career stories from Wellcome Trust staff

The Wellcome Trust is the organisation behind 'Big Picture'. As well as bringing you loads of great biology resources, the Wellcome Trust spends around £600 million every year to support biomedical research into improving animal and human health, both in the UK and internationally. We spoke to people from around the Trust about how they got to where they are today.

Alexis Gilbert, Wellcome Trust graduate trainee Alexis Gilbert followed a degree in psychology with postgraduate medical training, and he is now working at the Wellcome Trust as one of its first graduate trainees.

Alyson Fox, head of Grants Management At school, the only science careers Alyson Fox learned about were medicine and dentistry, but now she works in Grants Management at the Wellcome Trust, overseeing 3000 applications for funding from scientists every year.

James Peto, exhibition curator, Wellcome Collection James Peto is an exhibition curator at the London-based Wellcome Collection, a museum, art space, library and more. He works to develop science exhibitions, but has never had a single biology lesson.

Jen Middleton, media officer How does science get on the news or into the newspapers? Jen Middleton is a media officer, helping to connect scientists who carry out research funded by the Wellcome Trust with journalists to ensure there are accurate, interesting stories about science in the media.

Louise Fellingham, management accountant Louise Fellingham took science A levels and studied biology and zoology at university. But when she realised she did not want to pursue a career in science, a final-year project in business ignited an interest in accountancy.

Marta Tufet, international activities advisor, Science Funding After her science PhD, Marta Tufet was not sure what to do next. A job in scientific publishing opened her eyes to all the non-research careers in which you can use science.