Welcome to the MRC WIMM blog, a blog aimed at a scientifc, but non-specialist, audience. All posts are written by members of the MRC WIMM!
The Trojan Octopus
6 December 2019
Martyna Lukoseviciute, a PhD student in Tatjana Sauka-Spengler’s group, shares the story behind her winning image of an octopus embryo and the unexpected lessons she has learnt from it.
Childhood ALL: Same same but different!
For Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, Dr Andi Roy explains current challenges in the treatment of Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia and how research at the MRC WIMM is trying to tackle them.
The challenges of being a postdoc
To mark Postdoc Appreciation Week Lise Chauveau, Chair of the MRC WIMM Postdoc Association, reflects on the challenges of being a postdoc, and explains how the association is developing initiatives to support and encourage this peer group.
Machine learning meets microscopy - Subjectivity dethroned
How can we remove subjectivity from science, whilst keeping the human in the loop?
CRISPR-Cas9 – what’s left to know?
Dominic Owens, PhD student in the De Bruijn group at MRC MHU, recounts how puzzling results and a fortuitous lab meeting uncovered unexpected outcomes of CRISPR editing and changed the direction of his research.
From The Gambia to Oxford
Post Doctoral Researcher Caitlin Naylor discusses her experiences living and working at MRC Unit The Gambia at LSHTM.
Two for the price of one: active and passive immunity from trials of experimental vaccines
Therapeutic antibodies can be isolated from healthy volunteers exposed to the Ebola vaccine, but not Ebola virus itself.
An interview with Professor Angela Vincent
27 February 2019
In our second interview based in the MRC WIMM’s ‘An evening with’ events, we spoke to Professor Angela Vincent, Emeritus Professor of Neuroimmunology at the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences. Angela kindly spoke to us about her research on antibodies and their role in neuromuscular diseases, and shared her thoughts with the next generation of scientists.
From veterinary medicine to the MRC WIMM
Student Matt Dickinson discusses how he took the unusual decision to do a PhD in medical research following a degree (and practice) in veterinary medicine- and discusses the unexpected benefits of career changes.
A WIMMter Wonderland
17 December 2018
In this festive post, we look at how MRC WIMM researchers turned their science into decorations as part of this year's Christmas decorations competition.
An interview with Professor Walter Bodmer
28 November 2018
‘An evening with’ are informal events where established scientists with a connection to the MRC WIMM spend an evening with our students and staff, discussing their career and sharing their thoughts with the next generation of scientists. In this new feature in our blog, we interview the scientists who have kindly given their time to join this event, starting with Professor Sir Walter Bodmer, FRS, Emeritus Professor and Head of the Cancer and Immunogenetics Laboratory in the Department of Oncology.
Tri-C tells us which enhancers are in the loop
How do multiple enhancers control the activity of a single gene? A new paper from Marieke Oudelaar in the Hughes/Higgs labs presents a novel approach called “Tri-C”, which uncovers how cis-regulatory elements interact together in higher-order structures.
Clone Wars: A New Model
25 September 2018
How do rare mutations accumulate in tissues and how can this lead to cancer? In this post, Hannah discusses a new paper from Ed Morrissey's lab that uses mathematical modelling to study this process in the human colonic epithelium.
From the lab bench to the newsroom: my experience at The Guardian
As a PhD student at MRC HIU, I usually spend my days in a white lab coat peering down a microscope, but this July I temporarily gave all that up to undertake a placement on the science desk at The Guardian newspaper.
Preprints: revolution and resistance
Erdinc explains what preprints are, why he uses them.. and why he thinks you should too.
A bumpy – emotional – ride towards a PhD
15 May 2018
To mark Mental Health Awareness Week, Gregorio Dias shares his personal journey as a PhD student and discusses how a better work-life-balance and spending more time with friends helped him overcome the stress and anxiety that he faced during his studies.
Deciphering the complexity of blood progenitor cells
Blood production by haematopoietic stem and progenitor cells is complex, with multiple proposed models of differentiation. In this blog post, Zahra Aboukhalil, Bilyana Stoilova & Dimitris Karamitros discuss how the Vyas lab is using single-cell technologies to uncover the ways in which blood progenitors generate mature cells.
Breaking the link – how robust are gene expression networks?
The intricate biological cascades that fine-tune cellular protein production are hugely complex – and so is the task of deciphering them. We found out more about a new technique developed in the Fulga lab to disentangle this regulatory web.
Lights, Camera, Immuno-action!
19 December 2017
Melissa Bedard, a DPhil student in the Cerundolo Lab , writes about her research on invariant natural killer T cells, and the starring role they may be able to play in the fight against cancer.
Sensing viruses: The alarm system in our cells
Layal Liverpool, a DPhil student in the Rehwinkel lab, writes about her research on how cells are able to tell the difference between their own molecules and those of invading viruses.