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My Final Year Project

By Liza Petrova, BSc (Hons) Biomedical Sciences

Hi everyone! In January I began working on my final year project. In this blog post we will peek into a real neuroscience laboratory, check out the quirky equipment inside and I will share some details about experiments I do every day.

A bit of background

My project is about alpha-synucleinopathies, which are conditions where a protein called alpha synuclein (ASYN) is mutated and forms toxic “clumps” in the brain. Examples of alpha-synucleinopathies are Parkinson’s disease and dementia with Lewy bodies.

Image of hand shaking whilst holding a glass.
Parkinson’s disease. Photo by Alessandro Grandini on Adobe Stock
Continue reading “My Final Year Project”
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My Summer Travels with Cryptosporidium

Rosie, our Biomed undergrad tells you of her experience working in Wales and Liverpool on a summer research placement

By Rosie Gathercole

Working with poo turned out to be exactly the summer experience I wanted!

I worked at the national Cryptosporidium Reference Unit (CRU) at Public Health Wales in Swansea with Professor Rachel Chalmers and her team. I received a Scholarship from the Society for Applied Microbiology (SfAM) for this placement, writing the application together with Rachel.

Rosie with a computer screen behind her showing the live spectra produced by the mass spec machine
Me working on my summer placement

Cryptosporidium is a parasite that causes diarrhoea, is found globally and is typically passed from animals, other people, food and fresh water sources. It is currently a human health issue due to the significant effect it has in developing countries and the lack of specific treatments to fight the parasite. Quite often how well you recover from the illness depends on how healthy you were to begin with!

Continue reading “My Summer Travels with Cryptosporidium”
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So your immune system’s an overachiever; what I’m doing about it during my placement at GSK

By Emma McCarthy

“Hey, it finally worked!“

I look at the screen and smile. After an intensive six-hour lab session involving lots of careful pipetting, I’m ecstatic that the experiment I’ve spent weeks on has succeeded at last.

At the moment, I’m based in a biology research unit at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), one of the biggest pharmaceutical companies on the planet. I’ve been on placement here for over nine months; I still can’t quite believe it some days.

Continue reading “So your immune system’s an overachiever; what I’m doing about it during my placement at GSK”

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Student Enterprise Ambassador’s #EntrepreneurshipDiary: #2

John Cornilius was appointed as the School of Biomedical Sciences first ever Student Enterprise Ambassador earlier this year. Through a series of blog posts, his youtube channel and his LinkedIn profile, John aims to share reflections on his own enterprise journey. Follow along by clicking the #EntrepreneurshipDiary tag or the link in the sidebar.

Background Story Part #1

Hi guys!

As my LinkedIn profile indicates, I recently started a role at my university as a  Student Enterprise Ambassador. In this video I give an introduction to what this role means for me and you, as well as my motivation for applying. I will be creating some content regularly and posting that up as my business idea progresses from seed to idea to product.

Take care and leave me your feedback in the comments 🙂

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Student Enterprise Ambassador’s #EntrepreneurshipDiary: #1

Introducing our Student Enterprise Ambassador, John.

Hi, my name is John and I am a 3rd year Biomedical Sciences student with a business idea that I am pursuing while completing my degree at Newcastle University.  I was consequently nominated to be the Student Enterprise Ambassador for the School of Biomedical Sciences (SBMS). Continue reading “Student Enterprise Ambassador’s #EntrepreneurshipDiary: #1”

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Summer Placement Poster Presentation Event 2018

December saw our Summer placement poster presentation event with research presented from across the Faculty of Medical Sciences.

SBMS summer placement poster presentation event 2018, hosted in our new superlab.

First of all, let me thank all of you who presented/provided posters for the event, it was fantastic to see your hard work up on those poster boards in our swanky new lab! Secondly, I’d like to thank all of you who attended, asked questions and engaged with the event (not just for the mince pies).  Finally I’d like to thank our judges who did a sterling job deciding our prize winners! Continue reading “Summer Placement Poster Presentation Event 2018”

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My summer research really ‘complemented’ my degree

By Sam Murray – 3rd Year Biomedical Sciences student

Vacation Research Project

During the summer I worked alongside scientists in the Institute of Cellular Medicine in Newcastle University to complete a 8-week research project in Complement Immunology, and was paid £200 a week to do so! I produced a poster to communicate my research and defended it at the university wide Celebrating Research Scholarships & Expeditions presentation evening. I was awarded a Commendation for oral defence of the poster and also won 3rd prize at the School of Biomedical Sciences Summer placement poster presentations. Continue reading “My summer research really ‘complemented’ my degree”

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PARTNERing up for a great summer!

PARTNERs Student working in the lab

Another hugely successful PARTNERS project has just been completed within the School of Biomedical Sciences. Will our potential future Stars of Bioscience make the grade? We certainly hope so!

Each summer, we invite a select group of students to take part in a summer project designed to help them succeed in securing a place studying at Newcastle University. As part of the project, the participants work alongside academics (this year PARTNERS was lead by me, SJ Boulton and my colleague Damian Parry) and their team to undertake a piece of scientific research and communicate their findings through an ongoing scientific record. Continue reading “PARTNERing up for a great summer!”

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My Summer of Brains

By Libby Finnigan, Stage 3 Biomedical Sciences Student.

Day 1 of my summer project

After a very rainy 45-minute trek into Fenham to the Campus for Ageing & Vitality, I was feeling a little lost and unsure of what to expect from my very first day of placement. Of course, that all changed once I met my supervisor, Dr Kirsty McCaleese. 

Kirsty certainly did not strike me as the stereotypical white-coated mad scientist (well, at least not fully mad!). Honestly, she is one of a kind and I feel eternally grateful for each lesson she taught me, not just in on the project but for life in general. Continue reading “My Summer of Brains”