Radford was a postdoc and Royal Society University Research Fellow at the University of Oxford, then worked as a Lecturer in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Leeds in 1995, progressing to Reader in 1998 and Professor in 2000. She became the deputy director of the Astbury Centre for Structural Molecular Biology in 2009 then Director in 2012 - 2021.[5] Radford's research[9] investigates protein folding, protein aggregation and amyloid disease. Her multi-disciplinary research focuses include such disciplines as biochemistry, chemistry and medicine.
One major research focus is the role of protein misfolding in the onset of amyloidogenic diseases, including dialysis-related amyloidosis, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and Type II diabetes. This has been done with the use of native mass spectrometry, NMR and single molecule methods to characterize intermediates of protein folding and in amyloid formation.[5] A second research focus is on the folding of outer membrane proteins of Gram-negative organisms. Understanding the mechanics of how these proteins fold will help derive new antibiotics. A third arm looks at how the shelf life of pharmaceutical drugs could be extended.
