28 January 2015: Department of Pharmacology, Oxford University.

“Taking a closer look at vitamin B12”, delivered by CNBP researcher Dr Georgios Tsiminis and  co-author Dr Joanna Brooks from the ARC Centre for Research on Ageing, Health and Wellbeing at the Australian National University.

The talk gave an overview on the potential for using Raman spectroscopy as a minimally invasive tool to measure and track vitamin B12 levels in humans. Vitamin B12 deficiency has been identified as a potential modifiable risk factor for dementia and Alzheimer’s disease in later life and is also the mechanism through which pernicious anaemia affects humans (vitamin B12 does not get absorbed through food due to lack of intrinsic factor). Current techniques for measuring vitamin B12 in humans, such as microbial growth and ELISAs, are both resource- and time-consuming, resulting in the general population not being regularly tested for vitamin B12 deficiency. Our aim is to produce a portable device that can measure vitamin B12 and its associated chemical compounds in a reproducible, reliable, fast and minimally-invasive manor. In this talk we explained the basic principles of Raman spectroscopy and showed some initial results that generated great interest at Oxford, who have asked us to keep them up to date with future developments on our work.

To find out a bit more about this presentation see Martyn Hooper’s Blog post “the Blog from  he chair of the Pernicious Anaemia Society.

January 2015 – Summer student at Adelaide Node

Working with Dr Jinxian Yu and the recognise theme; Ms Yuan Yeoh has spent 6 weeks as a University of Adelaide summer research student.  It has been a pleasure to participate in a summer research project. This has given me an opportunity to learn, as well as to polish my lab skills. I feel happy to utilise the scientific knowledge into real-life applications. A summary of her project is described below.

Synthesis of Azobenzene as a Photo-inducible Molecular Switch

Azobenzene changes configuration (cis & trans) when illuminated with light of particular wavelength. This molecular switch can be incorporated into functional molecules, such as proteins, sensors, electronic devices, etc. Thus, by controlling the configuration of the switch, the electron transfer in functional molecules can be fine tuned.

25 January 2015:

This book chapter by CNBP researcher Dr Achini Vidnapathirana examines  ‘the applications of nanotechnology during pregnancy (current, research, and potential applications), the unique pregnancy-related characteristics that relate in the application of nanoscale materials, and the concerns on maternal/fetal well-being.’

http://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007/978-94-007-6178-0_100902-1/fulltext.html 

January 2015: Publication

Polymer based whispering gallery mode laser for biosensing applications

Alexandre François, Nicolas Riesen, Hong Ji, Shahraam Afshar and Tanya M. Monro

Appl. Phys. Lett. 106, 031104 (2015); http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4905931

For the full article click here

January 2015: Encouraging future scientists

Mr Hieu Tran from Fremont Elizabeth City High School spent a week with Dr Sabring Heng at Adelaide University gaining an insight into scientific research.

Hieu is very interested in science and hopes to do research in the future.