Today's Student Seminar @ 12:30

 

 

 

Institute Research Student Seminars

Speakers:  Katie Griffiths, Hanan Kashbour & Intan Abd Hamid

 

Venue: Seminar room L2.5, 2^nd floor, William Leech Building, Medical School

Date and time:  Wednesday 15^th October 2014 at 12.30

 

Katie Griffiths will present:

 

“Laser-scribed graphene: a genuine contender for point of care diagnostics?”

 

Graphene’s unique combination of properties owing to its 2D structure makes it very popular in many research areas. A new method utilising LightScribe disc labelling technology has demonstrated a simple, inexpensive solution to production of this material. The electrochemical behaviour of Laser-scribed graphene out-performs the gold standard of carbon electrodes, yet offers a more affordable, scalable manufacturing process. Such material is amenable to numerous point-of-care biological assays including enzyme based glucose sensors.

 

Key words: Biosensor, point of care diagnostics, grapheme

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Hanan Kashbour will discuss:

 

“An investigation of the molecular and the structural features of transverse tubule development in cardiac muscle.”

 

Transverse tubules are invaginations of the plasma membrane of cardiomyocytes facilitating rapid transmission of electrical action potentials throughout the cell and contribute to the process of excitation-contraction coupling (EC coupling).  Alterations in t-tubule conformation have been reported in heart failure (HF) and suggested to contribute to the impairment of EC coupling.  It is important, in order to offer clues for possibly correcting the cardiomyocyte abnormalities of HF, to understand the mechanisms involved in determining normal t-tubule structure and function. My project will examine the changes in cardiomyocyte structure (by transmission and scanning electron microscopy) occurring during development (in utero and post-natally) to adulthood. This will allow the assessment of t-tubule formation in relation to other important cardiomyocyte specialisations (z-lines, sarcomeric myofilament spacing, sarcoplasmic reticulum and mitochondria). 

 

 

Keywords: T tubules, EC coupling, Cardiomyocyte

 

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Intan Abd Hamid will speak on:

 

“Long-term outcome of SCID patients who had underwent Hematopoeitic Stem Cell Transplantation”

 

Severe Combined Immunodeficiency Disorder is a rare disease affecting 1 in 100,000 children.  It is considered one of the paediatric emergencies and most patients do not reach their 1 year old birthday if untreated. The focus of my research is to explore the long term outcomes of those who have been transplanted and how issues such as donors selection, conditioning regime, choices of stem cell source and genotype-phenotype association influence the outcome.

 

Keywords: Severe Combined Immunodeficiency Disorder (SCID), Hematopoeitic STem Cell Transplantation (HSCT), Long-term Outcome

 

 

Chair:  Anna-Lena Dittrich