Our people

Jonathan Padley is a specialist in English children’s literature from the eighteenth century to the present day. His work explores margins, particularly the marginalisation of authors, texts, and characters. His PhD argued that the child protagonists of children’s literature can be understood, etymologically and theoretically, as monsters. He serves on the Editorial Board of Children’s Literature in Education. As well as children’s literature, Jonathan is interested in interdisciplinary dialogues between literature, media, music, science, and theology. He has published broadly, including on transgressive creation in Shelley’s Frankenstein, bibliographical anomaly in Tennyson’s English Idyls, and Christological imaging in Tolkien’s Middle-earth mythos. Jonathan is a Fellow, Tutor, and the Lead Admissions Tutor at Churchill College. He is also a Bye-Fellow and Director of Studies in Education at Lucy Cavendish College; an Affiliated Lecturer at the Faculty of Education; and an Honorary Member of the Faculty of English. Alongside academic work, Jonathan is committed to widening participation in higher education. From 2013 to 2015, he was seconded to Welsh Government to co-lead the research and policy implementation which gave rise to Seren, to which he still regularly contributes.

Jonathan is Director of Studies for our Education degree.

After concluding his undergraduate studies in Brazil (with a year abroad at the University of Bristol), José came to Cambridge to pursue Part III of the Mathematical Tripos and a PhD. José now work as a Director of Studies and an Associate Tutor, and has been lecturing in Part III since 2022.  His research is in the Foundations of Mathematics, particularly Category Theory and its relationship to Logic, Geometry, and Computation. Other interests include facets of mathematical thinking and how its understanding affects education, pure and applied logic, computer science, and languages (broadly construed).

My research focuses on the intersection of political economy, economic sociology, and historical sociology. I am interested in the state, government elites, expert knowledge, and economic policymaking.

Dr Labarca is an Isaac Newton Trust Academic Career Development Fellow, with a focus on British politics, at the Department of Politics and International Studies. He is also a Bye-Fellow and Director of Studies in Human, Social, and Political Sciences at St Edmund's College. His academic background is interdisciplinary, combining degrees in History and Sociology. He received his PhD in Sociology from The University of Edinburgh. In 2023, the Political Studies Association awarded his PhD with the Walter Bagehot Prize for the best dissertation in the field of government and public administration.

Academic Profile 

Publications 

• Labarca, J.T., 'Towards a (minority) shareholder state? The Labour government's fiscal framework', 2025, The Political Quarterly, https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-923X.13517
• Labarca, J.T., 'Unintended institutionalization: how the politics of symbolic fiscal practices shapes economic policy', 2025, Socio-Economic Review, https://doi.org/10.1093/ser/mwae053
• Biehl, A., Labarca, J.T., & Atria, J. 'Class-based taxation: The fiscal paternalism of the Chilean income tax?', forthcoming, Journal of Iberian and Latin American Economic History.

Awards & Recognitions

• Political Studies Association’s Walter Bagehot Prize (2023) for the best dissertation in the field of government and public administration.

My research focuses on the application of large-scale statistical models to understand the causes and consequences of biodiversity change. My current role is as Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at Cambridge, focusing on the role of novel AI and economic mechanisms in solving biodiversity change.

Dr Millard is currently a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow in the Department of Zoology at the University of Cambridge. He has published across a number of areas of the biodiversity sciences and the application and ethics of AI in research. In particular, he led in developing the largest models of future global crop pollination risk resulting from human land-use and climate change, and led in developing the first real-time index of human interest in biodiversity. For such work Dr Millard was nominated twice by the Royal Society as an outstanding early career researcher. Specifically, he was selected to talk at the Royal Society at an event commemorating Prof Dame Georgina Mace, and to attend the 2025 Royal Society UK-China Early Career meeting in Beijing on biodiversity and the climate.

Dr Millard has provided scientific advice to the government at a high level, including contributing to a No. 10 SAGE (Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies) Cabinet Briefing on the reintroduction of COVID-19 restrictions, advising Sir Patrick Vallance on the biodiversity modelling work of the Natural History Museum, contributing towards a trade data guide for the Ecuadorian government, and writing 12 species trade reviews for the European Commission. Dr Millard has also been an expert reviewer for Conservation Letters, Ecosystem Services, Ecography, Scientific Reports, Global Ecology and Biogeography, Communications Earth & Environment, PLOS ONE, Conservation Biology, Nature Ecology and Evolution, and the UK research council BBSRC.

Prior to his current role, Dr Millard was a postdoctoral researcher at the Natural History Museum in London, an honorary non-stipendiary research fellow of Nuffield College, an associate member of the Department of Sociology at the University of Oxford, and an employee of the Nature Publishing Group and UNEP-WCMC (UN Environment World Conservation Monitoring Centre). He completed his PhD in Ecology jointly between University College London, the RSPB, and the Zoological Society of London, and a BSc (Zoology) and MSc (Biodiversity and Conservation) at the University of Leeds.

Academic Profile

Kristen MacAskill is an Associate Professor of Engineering, Environment and Sustainable Development in the Cambridge University Department of Engineering. She is a Chartered Engineer with the Institution of Civil Engineering. Before returning to a role in academia, Kristen worked for several years as a consulting engineer in the water and transport sectors.

Kristen is Director of Studies for our Engineering degree.

Her experience covers various areas of infrastructure development, including strategic-level options assessment, post-earthquake damage assessment, infrastructure design, project management, and sustainability assessment. Her research now focuses on systems analysis to advance approaches for managing risks and system resilience. Using cross-disciplinary research methods and examining information from different system levels (from international policy to local or even individual decision-making behaviours), she investigates governance issues in the management of critical infrastructure and the delivery of major projects.

Her research encompasses developing quantitative network models and, more unusually for an engineer, analysing qualitative data through stakeholder liaison techniques.

My research focuses on philosophical anthropology, disability, identity, neurodiversity, interdependence, and ill-health. I am currently working on the research initiative Disability and Knowledge at the Von Hügel Institute, which explores expansively the nature of knowledge from the perspective of disability studies and disability experiences.

Professional Biography

Lidia studied philosophy at the Universities of Milan, Italy, and Freiburg in Breisgau, Germany. After receiving a postgraduate research scholarship from the Catholic University of Milan, she moved to Dresden, Germany, where she carried out her doctoral research work while working as an assistant lecturer in Philosophy of Religion. She later obtained her PhD from Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, with a thesis on Edith Stein's critique of Martin Heidegger. She is currently a Research Associate at St Edmunds’ College, Cambridge, where she is also the VHI Research and Editorial Manager.

Lidia’s research background includes continental philosophy, particularly phenomenology, and philosophical anthropology. She has taught and published on dialogue, personhood, empathy, end of life, the philosophy of Edith Stein, Romano Guardini, and Martin Buber.

Key Publications

· [Forthcoming] Reflection on Parenthood and Loneliness: Loss, Time, and Presence, Journal of Moral Theology, 2025.

· (Eds with T. De Campos and P. McCosker) Special Issue: Navigating Impasses in Bioethics: End of Life, Disability, and Mental Illness, Journal of Disability and Religion, 22(3), 2018.

· Disability, Diversity, and Autism: Philosophical Perspectives on Health, The New Bioethics, 22(1), 2016, 56-70.

· Fenomenologia dell’essere umano e Analisi dell’Esserci, in A. Ales Bello - F. Alfieri - M. Shahid (eds), Edith Stein-Hedwig Conrad-Martius-Gerda Walther: Fenomenologia della Persona, della Vita e della Comunitá, Laterza: Bari, 2011.

· Being Thrown or Being Held in Existence? The Opposite Approaches to Finitude of Edith Stein and Martin Heidegger, Yearbook of the Irish Philosophical Society 2009, Maynooth.

I am a physiologist by training. My research previously focused on changes in cardiac metabolism in ischaemia and diabetes. However, I am now working on a new area looking at ancient DNA as a reflection of environmental change in Egypt, Sudan and the Fenlands.

Dr King completed her undergraduate degree at the University of Witwatersrand, and MSc and PhD in Cape Town, in South Africa. She then undertook post-doctoral research at the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Oxford, followed by a period at Pharmacology at Imperial College. She has taught for many years at the University of Cambridge and Anglia Ruskin University, and has extensive experience in teaching of physiology, biochemistry, cell and developmental biology, and genetics. She is an associate professor and was Deputy Head of the School of Life Sciences in charge of student experience, curriculum development, learning and teaching, and apprenticeship delivery for nine years. Her current focus is on teaching, research and pastoral support of students. She is working in collaboration with colleagues at Cambridge, UCL and Manchester., and in Luxor.

Academic Profile

Luana is Director of Studies for our Computer Science degree.

My research focuses on the relationships between religious diversity, education, and social cohesion. I explore how schools, universities and local communities can better navigate religious diversity, fostering respect and understanding across diverse religious and non-religious perspectives.

Dr Peacock's publications have contributed to understanding how education plays a role in creating inclusive societies, where diversity is seen as an asset rather than a challenge. Her research outputs have also influenced social practice and policy around religious inclusion and diversity.

Publications

• Peacock, L. and Guest, M. (2024) 'Worldviews, Religious Literacy and Interfaith Readiness: Bridging the Gap Between School and University'. Coventry University and Durham University
• Aune, K., Peacock, L., Guest, M. and Law, J. (2023) University Chaplaincy as Relational Presence: Navigating Understandings of Good and Effective Chaplaincy in UK Universities, Journal of College and Character 24(3), 197-216
• Peacock, L., Guest, M., Aune, K., Rockenbach, A. N., Staples, B. A. and Mayhew, M. J. (2023) 'Building Student Relationships Across Religion and Worldview Difference'. Coventry University, Durham University, North Carolina State University and The Ohio State University
• Peacock, L. (2021) 'Contact-based Interfaith Programmes in Schools and the Changing Religious Education Landscape: Negotiating a Worldviews Curriculum'. Journal of Beliefs & Values 44(1),1-15
• Peacock, L. (2021) 'Building Closer Communities: An Evaluation Report'. Coventry University