Charllotte Blacka
Research
Supervisor/s: Dr Jessica Hendy, Prof Kirsty Penkman, Dr Jackie Mosely
Funding: Adapting to the Challenges of a Changing Environment (ACCE) DTP
Amelogenin is a protein found in tooth enamel that is encoded on the sex chromosomes of many mammalian species. This results in differences in the peptides found within the enamel of biological males and females. My research aims to develop rapid, low-cost high performance liquid-chromatography-mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS) methods for exploiting the sex-dependent differences to identify the proteins present in an individual’s enamel, and therefore infer their biological sex.
Profile
I completed my integrated Master’s in Chemistry at the University of York in 2022, with my Master’s research focusing on analysing the organic components (namely, chlorophyll pigments and lipids) of sediment samples from basal peats to probe the changes in environmental conditions that occurred in these paleoenvironments.
My research interests lay at the intersection of analytical chemistry and archaeology, using advanced analytical techniques implemented in chemistry, such as high performance liquid-chromatography (HPLC) and mass spectrometry (MS), to study preserved biological and organic matter.
Publications & Awards
Publications
Blacka, C., Dowle, A., Lisowski, M., Alexander, M., Penkman, K., Hendy, J., Mosely, J. (2025) Rapid proteomic amelogenin sex estimation of human and cattle remains using untargeted Evosep-timsTOF mass spectrometry. Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry.
Blacka, C., Rainsford, C., Mosely, J., Penkman, K., Hendy, J., ‘Integration of rapid palaeoproteomic amelogenin sex estimation of cattle remains with complementary analyses reveals sex biases in an Iron Age Britain deposition’, International Council for Archaeozoology Archaeozoology, Genetics, Proteomics, and Morphometrics Working Group Meeting, Copenhagen, Denmark, 2025 (podium presentation)
Blacka, C., Rainsford, C., Mosely, J., Penkman, K., Hendy, J., ‘Rapid palaeoproteomic amelogenin sex estimation of cattle remains’, International Society for Biomolecular Archaeology, Turin, Italy, 2025 (poster presentation)
Blacka, C., Mosely, J., Penkman, K., Hendy, J., ‘Rapid proteomic sex determination of archaeological remains using ion mobility mass spectrometry’, Bruker Post-ASMS Go Local Edinburgh in Edinburgh, UK, 2024 (podium presentation)
Blacka, C., Mosely, J., Penkman, K., Hendy, J., ‘Ion mobility mass spectrometry for rapid enamel-based proteomic sex determination of archaeological remains’, Royal Society of Chemistry Analytical Research Forum, London, UK, 2024 (podium presentation)
Blacka, C., Mosely, J., Penkman, K., Hendy, J., ‘Rapid enamel-based palaeoproteomic sexing: developing mass spectrometric methods for sex estimation using enamel protein amelogenin’, UK Archaeological Sciences Conference, York, UK, 2024 (post presentation)
Blacka, C., Mosely, J., Penkman, K., Hendy, J., ‘Amelogenin sex determination: developing mass spectrometric methods for rapid enamel-based palaeoproteomic sexing’, International Society for Biomolecular Archaeology, Tartu, Estonia, 2023 (poster presentation)
Awards
Winner of the 2022 MChem Communicator of the Year award (McCOY) for the best video submission, summarising an assigned examinable research paper in 2.5 minutes - video link
Teaching and Impact
2022-2026: Chemistry undergraduate teaching laboratories demonstrator and 1:1 assessor
2025: Seminar facilitator and assessor - Introduction to Archaeological Science (ARC00006C, 20 credits)
