BCHC News – Page 2 – Barrett Centre for Helminth Control

The Queen awards BCHC members

This week, several members of BCHC attended a ceremony in Buckingham Palace to receive the Queen’s Anniversary Prize for pioneering work in parasitology. Queen Camilla presented the award and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak also praised the prize winners. The prestigious award recognises the work of scientists in the Department of Life Sciences here at Aberystwyth…

BCHC encourages next generation of parasitologists

This month, members of BCHC including Prof Karl Hoffmann, Dr Gabriel Rinaldi, Dr Jo Forde-Thomas and PhD student Sarah Davey attended a Careers event at Ysgol Penglais, Aberystwyth. The event was held for Year 8 students where BCHC members showed and discussed some of the work carried out at Aberystwyth University and hopefully inspired the…

Exciting new international partnership for BCHC members

Director of BCHC Prof. Karl Hoffmann has helped to establish a new international partnership; this collaboration involves several institutes around the world and aims to develop a vaccine for parasite diseases caused by helminths. On the path to discover vaccines against hookworms and schistosomes researchers will explore new ways of identifying molecular targets and…

Prestigious Queen’s Anniversary Prize awarded for parasite research at Aberystwyth

The Queen’s Anniversary Prize has been awarded to Aberystwyth University for its pioneering research into combating diseases caused by parasitic flatworms such as Schistomiasis and Fasciolosis. This prestigious prize celebrates excellence and innovation, awarded every two years it recognises outstanding work that benefits the wider world. Members of BCHC past and present are at the…

Functional Genomics Workshop in Brazil

During the last two weeks of September, BCHC member Prof Gabriel Rinaldi ran a workshop with colleagues in Brazil. The international online course aimed at presenting different functional genomic methodologies in parasites and their vectors, including interference RNA, CRISPR CAS knock-in and knock-out. The course focused on single-cell sequencing from the preparation to data analysis.…

DLS Festival of Research 2023

On Friday 15th September, the Department of Life Sciences (DLS) at Aberystwyth University held the first DLS Festival of Research. The event was a great success, providing an opportunity to share and celebrate the research taking place across the department. Several BCHC members took part, giving talks and presenting posters throughout the day. Talks included…

Sir Brian May visits Aberystwyth University

Last week, Sir Brian May visited Aberystwyth University. He presented a talk titled ‘The Insights of the Gatcombe Farm Project: Finally a working farm TB eradication strategy?’, he discussed the findings of the Bovine tuberculosis control project that has been ongoing on for several years at Gatcombe Farm in South Devon. The talk described the…

BCHC strengthens collaborations with Kingston University

On 31st July and 1st August, we welcomed Prof. Tony Walker from Kingston University to Aberystwyth. Tony gave a great seminar talk entitled ‘When parasitology meets cell biology: Mechanistic insights into the functional biology of schistosomes and the importance of host-parasite interplay’. While at Aberystwyth University Tony also met with several BCHC members to discuss…

Viva Success!

On 23rd June, Adam Burgess successfully defended his thesis: ‘The Fumarases of Schistosoma mansoni: A Novel Drug Target?’ He was examined by Professor Murray Selkirk from Imperial college London and Dr Russ Morphew from Aberystwyth University. Congratulations Dr Burgess!

Future collaborations with University of Perpignan

In April, BCHC member Dr Gabriel Rinaldi attended a meeting with collaborators at the University of Perpignan. At the university, they work on areas of Ecology and Neglected Tropical Diseases with a particular focus on different species of Schistosomes, including hybrids. The meeting was hosted by Prof Christoph Grunau, his team and Dr Ronaldo De…

BCHC News (page 2)