Q&A with Dr Coco Newton

Dr Coco Newton is working with teams across Cambridge, UCL, Delft and Strathclyde, E-Lab Research Associate Coco Newton defies all labels. Determined to transform dementia care, she is proving the value of interdisciplinary ecosystems for researchers.

You are a cognitive neuroscientist based in the Engineering Design Centre. Could you tell us about your journey to this particular lab and your current research?

My path to the Engineering Design Centre has been a winding one. Towards the end of my biomedical science degree at King’s College London, I became increasingly preoccupied by the paradox that people with early-stage dementia diseases like Alzheimer’s often sense profound changes in their thinking and memory long before doctors can measure them. It sparked my fascination with how technology might help close this gap between objective brain measures and subjective conscious reality. So for my PhD, I joined a team of clinical neuroscientists working across UCL and Cambridge to help them validate a virtual reality navigation task for detecting Alzheimer’s disease earlier. The results were striking: this test, unlike others, could identify individuals at higher risk. After my doctorate, I tried to spin the work out into a cognitive diagnostics company while also working on a new postdoctoral project with Alzheimer’s Research UK on wearable digital tools for early dementia diagnosis. But that whole experience taught me that good science and innovation alone aren’t enough — technology adoption in healthcare depends on how innovations are designed, implemented, and integrated into healthcare. That realisation led me to the Engineering Design Centre by way of an interdisciplinary Schmidt Science Fellowship, where I now focus on designing health technologies based on their integration into healthcare as a complex sociotechnical system.

You are working between University of Strathclyde, Delft University of Technology, UCL and Cambridge, and are a Research Associate of the King's E-Lab. What does a regular day look like for you?

Indeed, I seem to have spread myself across quite a bit of Europe recently! Each location has its own role. UCL is where I keep my neuroscience roots, collaborating with colleagues to develop new cognitive assessments for clinical use. Cambridge and my recent time at Delft have been all about the design and systems engineering aspects of making these new cognitive assessments usable, feasible and desirable in the health system. They’re the places where I can think creatively with designers and engineers about how healthcare actually works in practice. At Strathclyde, I’m working closely with a team that has strong ties to NHS Scotland, where we’re piloting the new UCL digital spatial memory tests in a real GP clinic. The E-Lab, meanwhile, is the heart of all these activities for me — a community where I can share ideas, frustrations, and weave everything together into a cohesive vision.

Your first experience as an entrepreneur is one of ‘failure resilience’. Can you explain how that helped your entrepreneurial mindset?

Yes, my first entrepreneurial venture was indeed a lesson in resilience. I tried to transform the findings of my PhD into a cognitive digital health spin-out company, but I wasn’t the sole owner of the intellectual property. Working with my co-founders — academics from UCL and York who did hold the IP — was a delicate balancing act. We had different visions, and ultimately, we couldn’t get the company off the ground. But that two-year experience was invaluable. It taught me that having good science doesn’t automatically guarantee a successful product. It’s as much about the people and the alignment of visions as it is about the idea itself. It also gave me a fantastic network of investors, founders, and colleagues in the Cambridge ecosystem. Now I feel completely at  ease reaching out to them for advice on new ideas. In the end, it made me more open and real-world focused, and it reinforced that spirit of trying, innovating, and not being afraid to fail. It’s all part of the journey.

You made the Blue (lightweight) Boat for the 2021 Boat Race. How did rowing help you during your time as a graduate student at Cambridge?

Rowing was something I stumbled into quite by accident as a graduate student. I turned up at a Michaelmas taster session at Robinson College (where I did my PhD), thinking I’d just give it a go — when in Rome, and all that. As a sailor though, I was immediately drawn to the water and began to really enjoy it. The summer after my first year I found myself missing rowing, so I joined the town Cantabrigian Rowing Club. The team there are so talented, and I discovered the beauty of that smooth glide through the water during sunrise, the camaraderie, and the thrill of pushing my own limits. Later on, a friend convinced me to trial for the Cambridge lightweight boat and I never expected to get far. But little by little, I made it through the selections and found myself rowing in the Boat Race. It was an incredible experience, especially during the pandemic, when the team became a vital source of friendship and structure. Winning against The Other Place was unforgettable, and it taught me that sometimes you don’t know what you’re capable of until you give it a try. After that high point though, I decided to hang up my oars and move on to other challenges like triathlon.

“Good scicnce and innovation alone aren’t enough — technology adoption in healthcare depends on how innovations are designed, implemented, and integrated.”

In five years’ time, what would you like to have seen happen in the research of Alzheimer’s disease?

I’d love to see a world where Alzheimer’s disease is no longer shrouded in fear and stigma. I hope that we reach a point where people feel comfortable seeing their GP as soon as they notice changes, knowing that GPs have reliable tools to test for biomarkers and cognitive shifts early on. And if someone does have positive results, there’s a treatment available right away — ideally before any significant neurodegeneration has begun. Ultimately, I’d like to see dementia become a thing of the past: something we can prevent or manage so effectively that it no longer casts the same shadow over people’s lives.