Dr Carstens is a medical scientist specializing in the field of human genetics. She joined the Division of Human Genetics (National Health Laboratory Service and University of the Witwatersrand) as a principal medical scientist in 2016. She has a particular interest in the application of next-generation sequencing technology to improve diagnostics for rare Mendelian disorders in African populations. She is an active member and past chair of the H3Africa Rare Diseases Working Group and co-investigator on the Deciphering developmental disorders in Africa (DDD-Africa) project.