Young researcher of the month
Our young researcher of the month is Hannah Donnelly. Hannah is currently a PhD student from Cell Engineering and recently participated in the British Orthopaedic Research Society 2016 Conference held at University of Glasgow.
About my research
During my undergraduate degree at the University of Glasgow I was certain I wanted to continue my studies to PhD, however it was not until I completed a project in tissue engineering with Professor Matthew Dalby in the Centre for Cell Engineering (CCE) that I realised the area I would like to pursue. Tissue engineering ties together the different disciplines of cell biology, engineering and medicine, taking the hard science and making it useful, and this fascinates me.
I am now one year in to my PhD with Prof Dalby in CCE, my project focuses on engineering polymers to create a 3-dimensional environment that will mimic the bone marrow ‘niche’. The bone marrow microenvironment contains a heterogeneous population of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) that help to maintain hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs), controlling their ability to balance self-renewal and differentiation, as well as proliferation and quiescence. I am developing a system in the lab that aims to mimic the major components of this bone marrow nano/microenvironment, using polymers that promote physiological-like organisation of extracellular matrix (ECM) proteins and growth factors that allow us to control MSC fate, to in turn regulate HSC behaviour. This study is novel in that the bone marrow is difficult to study in vivo, thus the ability to create a highly mimetic in vitro platform to study HSC and MSC phenotype and behaviour within the niche environment could be a valuable research tool.
About me
Alongside my lab work I like to have some side projects, for example after having just submitted my first manuscript, I am now currently working on writing a review for publication with a fellow PhD student. Recently, I was lucky to be involved in The Royal Society’s ‘Summer Science Festival’, a week long public engagement event in London, where we created an exhibit to present ‘nanokicking’, a collaborative project between CCE and gravitational waves physicists at the University of West of Scotland (UWS), at this event we were able to engage with members of the public, everyone from primary school children to RS fellows! In October, myself and fellow PhD students at CCE are taking part in the Biotechnology Young Entrepreneurs Scheme (Biotech YES), an innovative competition for early career researchers to raise awareness of commercialisation of the bioscience industry, where we will pitch our own biotech idea and business plan in a “Dragons’ Den” type scenario.
In my spare time I like to travel, run and do yoga. I enjoy spending time (drinking wine) with friends and cooking.
If you would like to feature as our Young Researcher of the Month, please contact Claire.Osborne@glasgow.ac.uk.