Mandy Peffers undertook a degree in Animal Science at the University of Leeds, followed by a veterinary degree at The Royal Veterinary College, qualifying as a veterinarian in 1995. She then spent 11 years in industry, private practice and having a family before returning to academia to undertake a PhD entitled ‘Proteomic and transcriptomic signatures of cartilage ageing and disease’ in 2013. Further Wellcome Trust supported PDRA was on ‘A Systems Biology Approach to Musculoskeletal Ageing’ for which she was awarded a Fellowship of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons. She is currently a Wellcome Trust Clinical Intermediate Fellow studying ‘The role of small nucleolar RNAs (snoRNAs) in cartilage ageing and disease’. Her particular research interests include the role of non-coding RNAs in cartilage ageing and osteoarthritis, understanding the pathogenesis of tendinopathy and identification of biomarkers for osteoarthritis. She is based at the University of Liverpool in the Institute of Ageing and Chronic Disease were her small group which currently includes four PhD students.