Richard Mayne
Senior Scientist
Senior Scientist
Richard is a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Blood and Transplant Unit Genomics to Enhance Microbiology Screening (BTRU-GEMS) project, funded by NIHR. His role involves analysing next generation sequencing (NGS) data to identify and classify pathogens in blood and transplant products.
Originally trained as an histologist, Richard is a state-registered Biomedical Scientist, but retrained via PhD in Computer Science, for which he studied computational biology. He has over four years of experience in postdoctoral research but has also held roles as a University Lecturer and a Principal Data Scientist in industry.
His current interests include application of bioinformatics to metagenomic screening, taxonomy of viruses and development of novel teaching and learning technologies.
Recent publications
A Snapshot of the UK Blood Donor Plasma Virome: A Retrospective Cross-Sectional Cohort Study.
Journal article
Kean K. et al, (2026), J Med Virol, 98
Revealing deep evolutionary relationships between RNA viruses using predicted structural models of viral RNA polymerases.
Journal article
Mönttinen HAM. et al, (2026), Mol Biol Evol
Bioinformatic identification of lentivirus transfer plasmid contamination causing false-positive HIV NAT results in a high-throughput molecular screening laboratory.
Journal article
Secret S. et al, (2026), Microbiol Spectr, 14
Comprehensive hallmark gene sequence, genomic and structural analysis clarifies new and established taxa within the Picornavirales.
Journal article
Mayne R. et al, (2026), Virus Evol, 12
Changes to virus taxonomy, the international code of virus classification and nomenclature, and the ICTV statutes ratified by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (2025).
Journal article
Simmonds P. et al, (2025), Arch Virol, 171