We are delighted to start working together with our new student reps - Daniel, Abi, Dewi, Philip, Tgan and all the many volunteers/reserves - to develop relationships and training events that remain relevant to our PhD students and their research plans.

We encourage all our students to approach their reps and trust them to act as interlocutors to the EASTBIO Management Group. 

More information about them here.
 

Jordan Mitchell, third-year EASTBIO student working with Professor Danielle Gunn-Moore at the Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Medicine, has two published papers in 2019 from his research:

a review article, 'Mycobacterial infections in cats and dogs,' at VNJ

and a research/clinical paper, 'Tuberculosis due to Mycobacterium bovis in pet cats associated with feeding a commercial raw food diet' at the Journal of Feline Medicine and Surgery.

Congratulations, Jordan!

Another year is concluded for the EASTBIO community with the much anticipated Annual Symposium on bioscience research, held at our partner institution University of Dundee on the 13-14 June 2019.

Welcome by EASTBIO 2019 Symposium host and EASTBIO Co-Director, Dr Edgar Huitema

The key event on the EASTBIO diary has attracted over a hundred and fifty delegates for two days of talks, poster presentations, a keynote address by UKRI BBSRC Strategy & Policy Officer Dr Abigail Harris, a highlight session on Career Paths and Stories, social events and many prizes. We had the honour of having excellent and engaging senior academics who acted as chairs to the five thematic sessions that embraced the entire range of research conducted by EASTBIO students:

New video on the NPIF Skills School ‘Broadening Horizons: Cultivating an Innovative Mind Set (Edinburgh, 4 - 5 June 2018) with advice from industry experts (click on the photo above to watch the video).

The BBSRC Innovator of the Year 2019 Award competition is now open, and the BBSRC has again a category for Early Career Impact that is particularly relevant to DTP current students and recent leavers. We rely on our community to spread the word, whether that means circulating relevant information or submitting specific recommendations to highlight excellent researchers and encourage them to apply.

Winners of each of the four categories – Commercial Impact, Social Impact, International Impact and Early Career Impact – will receive a £10,000 award, with a further £10,000 for the overall BBSRC Innovator of the Year winner. Awards will be presented at a high-profile event in London in May 2019.

Further information and links to submit either applications or recommendations can be found on our website.

The BBSRC Skills School ‘Broadening Horizons: Cultivating an Innovative Mind Set’ was held with great succes in Edinburgh, from Monday 4 to Tuesday 5 June 2018.

This event was supported by the BBSRC National Productivity Investment Fund (NPIF).

Read more here.
                     

NPIF Skills School ‘Broadening Horizons: Cultivating an Innovative Mind Set’

Edinburgh, 4 - 5 June 2018

This skills school “Broadening Horizons: Cultivating an Innovative Mind Set” has been developed by the BBSRC EASTBIO DTP and the BBSRC IBioIC CTP in partnership and close collaboration with 5 industry facilities: the IBioIC Flexible Downstream Bioprocessing Centre, Edinburgh (FlexBio); the National Phenotypic Screening Centre, Dundee; BioAscent / the European Screening Centre, Biocity, Newhouse; the Edinburgh Genome Foundry; and the Roslin Cell Therapies Ltd GMP facility, Edinburgh.  It draws on expertise and know-how from these complementary partners to address industry-identified needs and skills gaps.

Event programme.

Event website.

Winning in western blotting at Thermo Fisher Scientific (please click on the title to read more)
by Zandile Nare

Background information

I am a second-year EASTBIO PhD student within the Institute of Immunology and Infection Research at the University of Edinburgh. My research focuses on the identification of specific inhibitors of kinetoplastid RNA editing ligase 1 (REL1), a validated drug target, for use as lead compounds for the treatment of human and animal diseases caused by  kinetoplastid parasites (e.g. sleeping sickness, nagana, Chagas disease & various leishmaniases). A secondary goal of my PhD is to understand structure-activity relationships of REL1 and the other kinetoplastid ligase; REL2.

PIPS project background and motivation for pursuing project

Stevie Bain, final year EASTBIO PhD student at the University of Edinburgh, was invited by Springer nature group to blog on her research. Stevie works on Parental Genome Elimination (PGE), a unique type of genomic imprinting.

Her resulting blog - "Paternal genome elimination: investigating a strange reproductive strategy" - can be found here.