| 13th
Annual Centre for Gene Research Poster Evening, 22nd June
2006.
The Centre for Gene Research Annual Poster Night, 2006,
was again held at the Otago Museum. Sixty four people registered
for the event but we had over 70 turn up on the night. This
was despite the icy, uncertain weather of the coldest June
in Dunedin in over 30 years.
Dr David Ackerley got the evening off to a great start.
His entertaining and highly informative seminar on directed
evolution was appreciated by all. Dr Ackerley used illustrations
from his own research to show how enzymes can be engineered
to perform more efficiently and put to different uses. To
do this he introduced genetic variation into a system and
the resulting mutants were screened for improved function.
Dr Ackerley outlined a number of ingenious methods for introducing
this variation and selecting for it. Applications for his
work included decontamination of sites polluted by hexavalent
chromium, a highly soluble industrial by-product, by ‘evolving’
a bacterial quinone oxidoreductase enzyme. This enzyme was
of further interest for its prodrug applications in activating
chemotherapy agents. Dr Ackerley is an ex-Otago graduate having
gained his PhD with Iain Lamont in 2000. Until recently he
held a Postdoctoral position at Stanford University, USA.
He is now a lecturer at the School of Biosciences, Victoria
University, Wellington, New Zealand.
Our
student poster competition this year included a 4-slide Powerpoint
file that captured the essence of each poster. This file was
made available to our judging panel a few days prior to the
event to help familiarize them with each student’s work.
We had a record number of student poster entries and the standard
this year was again outstanding. Six prizes were awarded and
the winners were:
| Student Prize Winners |
|
| Melanie Havler |
Centre for Gene Research Prize |
| Callum Smits |
Functional Genomics, Gene Expression & Proteomics
Prize |
| Karla Mettrick |
Oral Microbiology and Dental
Health Prize |
| Yu Chen |
Virology Prize |
| Patsarin Rodpothong |
invitrogen Prize |
| Rachel Wilson |
IMMUNET Prize |
| Other Award Winners |
|
| Merilyn Hibma |
Speedy Gonzales Award |
| Kamali Pugazhenthi |
The Annual FISH Award |
|
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Thank you to our judging panel for a sterling effort in selecting
the winners. It was not easy given the high standards. Our
judges this year were David Ackerley, Paul Hessian, Craig
Marshall, Sarah Young, Kyle Beggs and Steve Fleming.
The CGR Poster Evening would not be complete without awarding
the traditional Speedy Gonzales Prize and the ‘Fish’
Award. Merilyn Hibma claimed this year’s Speedy Gonzales
and the ‘Fish’ prize was won by Kamali Pugazhenthi
for her poster “Role of mitochondria on the anti-scarring
effects of melatonin in a full incisional model of dermal
wound healing in rats.” The CGR would like to thank our sponsors. This year they were Invitrogen, The Functional Genomics, Gene Expression and Proteomics Theme, The Oral Microbiology and Dental Health Theme, Virology and IMMUNET. Without their support our midwinter event would not be possible.
If you would like to see more of this year's mid-winter CGR poster evening please view our photo gallery.
Thanks to all who helped bring the event together and to those who braved the weather to attend. We look forward to seeing you all again next year!
The photo
gallery is here.
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