Carol is a senior lecturer at the University of Reading, where she leads the ‘crops in the food chain’ theme in the Centre for Food Security. Her expertise is in plant sciences and she is based in the department of Food and Nutritional Sciences. Carol’s research team are working on a variety of projects linked to improving nutritional quality, flavour and yield of horticultural and arable crops. The team recognise that simply providing the population with fruit and vegetables isn’t enough; understanding consumer preferences and finding ways to encourage consumption are a key part of what we do. Carol’s research team are multinational, and address issues of global food security and nutritional security. She works closely with the Crops for the Future Research Centre in Malaysia, where she also has researchers based, and where she is a leader of the FoodPlus programme. Through these links the teams are able to explore some of the world’s underutilised crops, for the benefit of the local communities that cultivate them, and to unlock some of the nutritional and agronomic benefits that they contain.