Blog posts

Stimulating research and collaboration in trauma

image001You are cordially invited to attend the Royal British Legion Centre for Blast Injury Studies Annual Networking Event on Tuesday 24th November at 10:30am.

The event will take place at the Royal School of Mines, Imperial College, South Kensington Campus.

image002A schedule of speakers and details of registration can be found here.

Please contact cbis@imperial.ac.uk if you have any questions.

Young Scientists attend Annual Meeting of New Champions 2015 in China

WEF 4

Each year, the World Economic Forum selects 40 outstanding young scientists from around the world to participate alongside global business and political leaders in the Annual Meeting of the New Champions. These scientists are selected from a wide range of disciplines and deliver updates on the latest trends and developments from various branches of science.

This year, Dr Kirill Veselkov and Dr Jia Li were nominated and successfully selected to join the Young Scientist programme in China. Both attended the Annual Meeting of the New Champions, which took place on 9-11th September in Dalian, People’s Republic of China.

Dr Kirill Veselkov, Lecturer in Computational Medicine, said ‘The event was truly impressive, and was attended by high profile guests from all key stakeholder groups in translational science including senior statesmen, policy makers, entrepreneurs and scientists, regulatory organisations and publishing groups. The panel sessions and live debates were very interesting and showcased the work of the brightest young scientists in the world. The meeting was also a fantastic opportunity for me to expand my network of international collaborators for the future.

Dr Jia Li, Lecturer in Computational Medicine wrote: “I was really honoured to be selected to attend this Annual Meeting and it was a fantastic and unforgettable experience. The format of the meeting was dynamic and interactive. As a basic scientist working in biomedical research, my favourite sessions at the conference were held at the Health Dome and the IdeasLab. In the Health Dome, we had interesting discussions about current and future health issues and policies and it was great to hear the opinions from people of different backgrounds. The presentations given at the Ideas Lab were impressive and I’d like to congratulate the Synthetic Biology team, who performed an excellent session there. After the meeting at Dalian, I was also invited to attend an IC alumni event in Beijing on the 12th September. It was a great pleasure to meet both IC alumni of 30 years, as well as prospective IC students.”

WEFKey points to emerge from this year’s meeting included the announcement that a European Innovation Council (EIC) is likely to be created within the next few years to encourage applied, commercially-driven research, and the statement from NIH that there would be a continued shift from “project based” to “person based” funding with more grants being awarded to individual investigators.

Nature Publishing Group also announced plans for a double-blind peer-review model, with the possibility for authors to withhold their names and affiliations from reviewers. It is likely that an open, interactive peer-review process would be introduced to some of the Nature journals early next year.

Detailed dialogue was also held between all major stakeholders regarding the global economic downturn, the anticipated impact this will have on research funding over the next few years, and potential measures to counteract this slowdown.

Upcoming events in 2015

  • Thinking about a baby?
    Workshop aimed at all Postdocs in the Faculty of Medicine to explore the issues surrounding having a baby
    8th October , 2 pm – 2nd Floor Clinical Science Centre Seminar Room

          More details

  • Surgery and Cancer Departmental Meeting
    Meeting for all S&C staff to discuss changes to the Department and the upcoming Silver Athena SWAN application
    21st October, 3:30 pm – G34, SAF Building, South Kensington
  • How to support staff going on maternity leave
    This event is designed for managers in the Faculty of Medicine who want to know more about how to support staff going on maternity and paternity leave. The session will include a question/answer session covering the most common queries from both managers and staff, and a number of case studies of common scenarios and conversations which need to be held between managers and the staff going on leave.
    28th October, 3:00 pm – Wolfson cafe area, Hammersmith
  • First Departmental Athena SWAN Lecture
    Surgery and Cancer’s first Athena SWAN Lecture, delivered by Miss Clare Marx, the first female President of the Royal College of Surgeons
    2nd December, 5:00 pm – G34, SAF Building, South Kensington, 

 

Advances in patient safety: CPSSQ Symposium 2015 review

 

CPSSQPatient safety experts gathered for the Centre for Patient Safety and Service Quality (CPSSQ) annual symposium last week. The CPSSQ is a partnership between Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust and Imperial College London and comprises a highly specialised set of research groups, working together to improve patient safety and the quality of healthcare services.

Read the full review here.

Abstract secures funding to attend symposium

Congratulations to Mr Edward St John, Clinical Research Fellow supervised by Prof Ara Darzi, Prof Zoltan Takats and Mr Dan Leff, who has won a prestigious American Association for Cancer Research Scholar-in-Training Award after his abstract was highly rated.

The prize money will go towards Mr St John attending the 2015 Breast Cancer Symposium, in San Antonio, Texas this December where he will present his abstract: Rapid evaporative ionisation mass spectrometry towards real time intraoperative oncological margin status determination in breast conserving surgery

 

Clinical Applications of Solid Phase Micro Extraction (SPME)

The Division of Computational and Systems Medicine is delighted to present:
Professor Janusz Pawliszyn, Professor of Analytical Chemistry, University of Waterloo, Canada

CSM Guest Seminar_Sept 2015 Prof  Pawliszyn 15092015v2“Clinical Applications of Solid Phase Micro Extraction (SPME)”
Tuesday 29 September 2015 at 10 – 11am
Lecture Theatre 311, Huxley Building, South Kensington

Chaired By: Professor Zoltan Takats
For more information contact:
Professor Zoltan TakatsDr Phyllis Quinn 

Event details

Fellowship to fund research on type-2 diabetes resolution following bariatric surgery

indexCongratulations to Nicholas Penney, a clinical research fellow supervised by Prof Elaine Holmes, Prof Ara Darzi and Mr Sanjay Purkayastha who has recently been awarded the Sutherland-Earl Clinical Research Fellowship 2015 by the Diabetes Research and Wellness Foundation.

The value of the award is £209,164 and will fund research toward his clinical study which is looking at the mechanisms and prognostication of type-2 diabetes resolution following bariatric surgery.

GAP year students work with Digestive Diseases PROLIFICA project in Gambia

Three future medical students starting this year, spent their gap year in Gambia working with the PROIFICA team which is part of the Digestive Diseases division.

PROIFICA (Prevention Of Liver Fibrosis & Cancer in Africa) is an EC funded project investigating liver cancer, which arises because of cirrhosis of the liver, a chronic condition that can stop the liver from functioning.