Emma Teeling, head of the Bat Lab in University College Dublin (UCD) is preoccupied with finding out why bats live such long and healthy lives. She believes the answer could help people age in a healthier way.
Emma, a lecturer in evolution and genetics, was always interested in the natural world. In secondary school, at the Holy Faith Convent in Clontarf, Dublin, she discovered she was good at science. “It was a real eye opener in secondary school, how brilliant science could be,” she says.
Her parents always supported her, but a job in science wasn’t an obvious choice. “I was terrified because how was I going to get a job [in science]? And what kind of jobs do scientists have anyway? I was particularly interested in zoology,” she remembers.
Studying wildlife worldwide
Emma opted for science in UCD and was inspired by the lecturers she met. Her four-year degree included a study of deer in the Phoenix Park. Then she did a master’s degree in Edinburgh, which saw her travel to remote areas of Canada to study swift foxes.
Since then, Emma has travelled widely – including the US, Australia, Malaysia, Brazil and Thailand – to discover more about bats, their genetics and evolution. She has research projects in Thailand, Myanmar and France. “I still want to find the answer to the questions that fascinated me as a child,” she explains. “It drives you half mad but, if you are born with that desire, you are better off doing it.”
When Emma came home from Edinburgh, she still wasn’t certain about becoming a scientist. But then she saw a sign for a PhD student to study bats in Queen’s University Belfast. She decided that this is what she wanted – to study how animals evolved. She wanted to combine an understanding of animal behaviour with genetics, which uses exciting new DNA techniques. Her studies mixed lab and field work.
Bats about everlasting youth
After Belfast, she worked in the US for the National Cancer Institute, investigating the evolution of different diseases in animals.
Today Emma’s research again touches on human disease. “Bats are a most unique animal. They live a ridiculously long time at a high metabolic rate,” she says.
Most small mammals live fast and die quickly, but bats live very fast and can live over 40 years. Emma is studying their DNA to see how they do this. She believes it could provide treatments for diseases such as cancer or Alzheimer’s. “They potentially have the secret for everlasting youth,” she says.