Angus began his research career with an honours year at Monash University in the group of Professor James Whisstock, working under the supervision of Dr Ruby Law. The project focused on production, refolding and biochemical characterisation of a plasminogen activator (blood thinning enzyme) from pit viper venom. Following a year away from study for travel in the U.K. and Europe, Angus returned to Australia to take up a PhD position under Associate Professor Peter Czabotar and Professor Peter Colman at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research. Here, Angus developed a strong interest in structural biology and structure-based drug design, working on cell death proteins involved in apoptosis, a form of programmed cell death. Angus crystallised and solved structures of several of these proteins and worked to characterise their function biochemically and in cells.
Upon completion of his PhD, Angus took up a post-doctoral position with his PhD supervisor Associate Professor Peter Czabotar. Working as part of an early-stage drug discovery team attempting to develop inhibitors of necroptosis in collaboration with a pharmaceutical company, Angus solved crystal structures of the target with inhibitors bound and was also involved in characterisation of inhibitor binding modes using ITC and MST.
Angus made the move to Dundee in January 2020 to join the Ciulli Group to work on E3 ligases, keen on expanding his knowledge of structural biology, structure-based drug design and biochemistry.
Outside of work, Angus is interested in many genres of music and enjoys travel, hiking, squash, swimming and watching Australian rules football.