Research

A monochromator-based fluorescence spectrophotometer system, costing over £25,000, bought with the Higher Education Funding Council capital fund, has been installed in the Guy Hilton Research Centre at Hartshill.
 
Dr Alan Harper and Dr Catriona Kelly both started at Keele in the School of Life Sciences in autumn 2010 and have been building up their research groups.  Since his appointment Alan has made frequent short visits back to Cambridge University to utilise similar equipment there, which he has had to fit around many other academic commitments.  His research is focussed on the underlying mechanisms that cause deep vein thrombosis, pulmonary embolism, heart attack and stroke, in particular through understanding the calcium signalling mechanisms of platelets in the blood.

 

By procuring the equipment for use in Keele, it significantly facilitates the development of Dr Harper's research by removing his dependency on travelling to acquire data. Catriona hopes to study intracellular calcium signals in collaboration with Alan, which is presently not possible at Keele on the scale she needs.  ISTM already has a couple of spectrophotometer systems in the GHRC but neither proved technically suitable for Alan and Catriona's experiments, and the new machine has added useful features such as magnetic stirring and sample temperature control.

 

Of the four specific studies put forward to start as soon as the Spectrophotometer is commissioned, two bring in other Keele collaborators: mathematical modelling of cytosolic calcium signals with Dr Theocharis Kyriakou (EPSAM), and 3D blood vessel models with Dr Ying Yang. Hence ISTM is confident the new equipment will have long-term use across a broad range of multi-disciplinary translational research.