I obtained my MSc in Molecular Biology at the University of Zagreb, Croatia in 2000, before undertaking a PhD in Biology with thesis work carried out at Yale University, USA, between 2000–2003. My undergraduate and PhD research experience includes the regulation of the DNA damage response in actinomycetes and studies of the mechanisms ensuring the fidelity of protein biosynthesis. In 2004 I joined Cancer Research UK at the London Research Institute (now part of the Francis Crick Institute in London) as a Post-doctoral Fellow in Stephen West’s group investigating the roles of several novel DNA repair factors. In January 2009 I started my first independent position at the Cancer Research UK Manchester Institute. In 2013 we moved our laboratory to the Sir William Dunn School of Pathology, University of Oxford.