Toby Baril

I am fascinated by the inner workings of the genome and its many functions, and enjoy working towards understanding this further. I am interested in the development and use of bioinformatics analyses to accurately identify and characterise transposable elements (TEs). I use these methods in large-scale comparative studies to elucidate the evolutionary dynamics of TEs to understand how TEs interact with their hosts to contribute to genomic complexity.

I completed my Masters of Biochemistry at the University in Southampton in 2018, where I focused on hapylotype-specific methylation and how these might be contributing to diseases such as Diabetes and Schizophrenia. This piqued my interest in bioinformatics (as I do love data!) and led me to join the Hayward lab in 2018 to undertake my BBSRC SWBio PhD project.

I spend most of my spare time surfing, trail running and climbing.

For a list of my publications, please visit my Google Scholar page