Patricia has over 25 years in biomedical science, building an international profile based on cross-disciplinary collaboration and global engagement. 

As Professor of Biochemistry, she has published over 70 peer-reviewed articles, including PNAS and Nature Communications. She directs the UCD Institute for Discovery, leading out on interdisciplinary collaboration in the university and recently launching the UCD AI Healthcare Hub, with the goal to empower non-coding researchers to accelerate their data-rich projects. She is PI of the AI PREMie project and has successfully steered this to receive over €1.5m funding and international recognition including, Runner Up Prize in the SFI AI for Societal Good Challenge (2019); NovaUCD Invention of the Year Award (2021); AI Ireland Awards, Best Application of AI to achieve Social Good (2022); AI Ireland Awards, Best Application of AI in an Academic Research Body (2022); and the AI and Analytics Award for Societal Good (2023).

Moreover, the International Research Centre on Artificial Intelligence (IRCAI), under the auspices of UNESCO, selected AI PREMie as “Excellent” in the list of the world’s top 100 projects using AI to solve problems related to the 17 United Nations SDGs. Finally, she has also won several personal awards for her collegiality/collaborative leadership style, including a UCD value in Action award (2018) and the SFI National Mentorship Award (2021).