Rate My Professor Sonya Fenton

Sonya Fenton is an Assistant Research Fellow with the Dunedin Colorectal Cohort in the Department of Surgery and Critical Care (Dunedin School of Medicine), Faculty of Medicine, University of Otago. In this capacity, she plays a key role in facilitating high-quality, clinically relevant research into the development and spread of colorectal cancer through collaboration with a multidisciplinary team comprising clinicians, researchers, and community members. Her responsibilities encompass obtaining patient consent, collecting and processing biospecimens, interpreting and collating clinical data, and liaising with University of Otago researchers, Te Whatu Ora Southern clinical staff, and Southern Community Laboratories. The Dunedin Colorectal Cohort consists of biospecimens and associated clinical data from approximately 2000 individuals diagnosed with colorectal cancer, providing a valuable resource for researchers seeking access via the cohort's official channels.

Fenton earned her Bachelor of Biomedical Sciences with Honours (BBiomedSc (Hons)) from the University of Otago in 2020. Her honours research project, supervised by Roslyn Kemp, investigated 'Tumour Necrosis Factor Signalling Heterogeneity in Macrophages.' She has contributed to multiple research outputs as a co-author. These include the 2025 publication 'A novel approach to digital characterisation of Tertiary Lymphoid Structures in colorectal cancer' in Frontiers in Immunology (Munoz-Erazo et al.), focusing on advanced imaging techniques for cancer tissue analysis. In 2024, she co-authored the conference abstract 'Predicting colorectal patient prognoses by functional characterisation of heterogeneous cell types and their spatial interaction using a new technique: Whole slide imaging mass cytometry' in Cancer Research (Costello et al.). Additional contributions feature the 2025 abstract 'Digital assessment of tertiary lymphoid structures in cancer using whole slide imaging mass cytometry' in Cancer Immunology Research (Park et al.), and acknowledgements for her assistance in cohort management in 'Discovery of prognostic lncRNAs in colorectal cancer using transcriptomic analysis of the Dunedin Colorectal Cancer Cohort' (Pinkney et al.). Earlier works from 2022 include co-authorship on 'Therapeutic knockdown of miR-320 improves deteriorated cardiac function in a mouse model of type 2 diabetes' in Molecular Therapy (Ghosh et al.), as well as several verbal presentations at the 16th New Zealand Medical Sciences Congress on topics such as miRNA-138 in diabetic cardiac autonomic neuropathy and ghrelin loss in cardiovascular disease among Pacific peoples. She holds membership in the Gut Health Network.