Question: why did you choose to work in the area of science you are currently working in?

Vicki Onions answered on 14 Jun 2010:

Hi!
Basically I wanted to stay in science and continue doing research, but i was keen to do research that i thought was “important”. And to my mind, that meant doing something that would benefit people in terms of health/wellbeing. However my degree was in animal sciences and I was not medically trained at all (heaven help the NHS if i was!!) One of my lecturers while i was doing my undergraduate degree was one of the scientists involved in the early work of freezing ovarian tissue and grafting it back in the sheep – he was part of the group that actually got the first live lamb born from previously frozen ovarian tissue (a BIG deal in my line of work!!) He was keen to further this work and look at whole ovarian freezing and so was offering the chance to do a PhD (a research degree) in this work. It sounded perfect for me – it was a chance for me to do something that could potentially help lots of girls and young women who had suffered the trauma of cancer and its treatment, to be able to put that behid them and have a “normal” reproductive life that lots of other women take for granted. It was particularly important for me too because my mum had had breast cancer when i was younger and so I had first hand experience of the kind of women this could help. So I applied for the PhD, got accepted and the rest is history!