Dr Ruth Kirk

Contact

Email: ruth.kirk@kingston.ac.uk
Location: Penrhyn Road
Faculty: Faculty of Health, Science, Social Care and Education
School: School of Life Sciences, Pharmacy and Chemistry
Department: Department of Applied and Human Sciences

About

I am a eukaryotic parasitologist, specialising in molecular identification and ecology of aquatic helminths. Early research focused on introduced parasites of fish such as Sanguinicola inermis in carp (PhD, Royal Holloway University of London and Thames Water), Anguillicoloides crassus in eels (Leverhulme Trust Research Postdoctoral Fellowship, University of Exeter and Royal Holloway) and Atractolytocestus huronensis in carp (Research Fellowship, Kingston University). I worked as an aquatic consultant and then joined Kingston University as a research fellow, progressing to associate professor. I have supervised MSc and PhD research projects on schistosomiasis, fish parasites, histology, cercarial dermatitis and led the UK Digenean Diversity Project which has resulted in molecular identification of many digenean parasites of freshwater snail vectors in the UK for the first time. I am also generating a UK Freshwater Fish Parasites Database with my colleague, Dr Bernice Brewster. I am currently a Visiting Senior Fellow at Kingston University.

Academic responsibilities

Visiting Senior Fellow in Parasitology

Qualifications

PhD Fish Parasitology (University of London)
BSc (Hons) Biological Sciences (University of London)

Teaching and learning

Qualifications and expertise

Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
PG Certificate in Teaching and Learning in Higher Education

Research

My research publications can be accessed from https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Ruth-Kirk/research. My current research focuses on:

UK Digenean Diversity Project - using phylogenetics to identify digenean parasites transmitted by freshwater snail vectors
UK Freshwater Fish Parasites Database with Dr Bernice Brewster
Incidence, impacts and assessing risk of cercarial dermatitis
Cell signalling in schistosomes
Helminth parasites of freshwater fish, particularly introduced species

Areas of specialism

Aquatic parasitology

Scholarly affiliations

Member of the British Society for Parasitology
Fellow of the Linnean Society
Fellow of the Zoological Society of London

Research student supervision

Leadership and management

I am an external and internal assessor of grant applications for international research councils and provide peer reviews for many life science journals and books.

Gallery of work

Life cycle of avian Schistosomatidae parasites

Avian schistosomatid parasites cause pathology in a variety of birds and are agents of human cercarial dermatitis.

Cercaria of Trichobilharzia franki

Cercariae of avian schistosomatids like T. franki emerge from snails and swim in the water to find a bird host, but may accidentally penetrate human skin causing cercarial dermatitis.

Life cycle of Schistosoma mansoni - an agent of human schistosomiasis

Human schistosomiasis is an acute and chronic disease that affects over 200 million people, prevalent in tropical and subtropical areas of the world.

Scanning electron micrograph of Schistosoma bovis - an agent of ruminant schistosomiasis

Hybrid forms of S. bovis-S. haematobium can infect humans and are reported in West Africa and Corsica.

Life cycle of echinostomes

Many types of echinostome parasites cause a gastrointestinal disease known as echinostomiasis. People can be infected when they eat infected raw or undercooked aquatic products like fish or molluscs.

Cercaria of Echinostoma revolutum, an echinostome parasite

Echinostoma revolutum is distributed worldwide, but only causes disease when raw or undercooked second intermediate hosts (e.g. fish, molluscs, frogs) are traditionally eaten as in E and SE Asia.