The scientist helping other scientists break through the ‘big-data bottleneck’

Dr Condon said actually operating complex microscopes is one focus of his work, while the other is being able to interpret the massive amounts of data which is generated by them.

Instead of just looking at a cell on a slide, scientists can capture data in 3D over minutes or even hours, which can result in terabytes of data which needs to be sorted through and analysed.

“It is now very easy to generate over a terabyte of data in under an hour, but that’s only half the story,” he said.

“It’s all very well to have a hard drive full of data, but unless you can analyse it and quantify what’s happening, then it’s…