Kathryn specialises in the preparation and prosecution of patent applications in the fields of general, organic and pharmaceutical chemistry, natural product chemistry, medicinal chemistry, agricultural chemistry, clean technologies, nanotechnology and chemical processing. She is experienced in conducting patent oppositions and providing advice on patentability, patent infringement and validity of patents as well as conducting inventorship audits. During her Masters degree, Kathryn studied the mechanism of non-classical Wittig reactions using NMR and xray crystallography. Her PhD studies at the Australian National University related to the total synthesis of natural products. Kathryn was awarded a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of St Andrews, Scotland, studying enzyme kinetics and mechanism. She also isolated significant amounts of protein and studied protein structure by NMR. Kathryn's second post-doctoral fellowship was at the Heart Research Institute in Sydney, conducting research on the role of antioxidants in the oxidation of low density lipoprotein and the formation of arterial fatty plaques. Kathryn joined Davies Collison Cave in 2000 from another patent attorney firm and became a partner in 2008.

Kathryn jointly heads Davies Collison Cave's Clean Technology Practice Group. Her experience in clean technologies includes water and sewage treatment, green chemistry reactions, clean chemical processing, rechargeable batteries, electrochemical devices, environmentally friendly wood treatment and biosensors for environmental testing.

Kathryn contributes to the Nanotechnology Practice Group in the areas of stabilised emulsions and foams, micro-fluidic technologies, processes for manufacturing micro- and nano-scale particles and analytical and diagnostic devices with nanocoatings including biosensors for detecting chemicals in biological fluids, food, water and environmental samples.