Year 5 students celebrate first co-authorship
Year 5 student doctors James Baker and Prashant Aggarwal first embarked on their research journey while intercalating in Biomedical Sciences and Translational Medicine at the University of Liverpool.
James says, "We both worked under the supervision of Professor Chris Probert, an excellent tutor and supervisor, and were assimilated into his research team where we developed invaluable skills that will improve our future clinical output."
Their research focused on volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and metabolomics. VOCs are produced by a variety of processes including degradation from metabolic pathway intermediates and can therefore be used as biomarkers of disease.
Thanks to bursaries from North West Cancer Research, James and Prashant were able to focus their efforts on cancer research, an area they are both extremely passionate about. An additional intercalation award for James from the prestigious Wolfson Foundation further helped support his studies.
These optimised methods will underpin our future research studying biomarker identification in lung cancer and another larger study exploring the biology of dying.
James and Prashant had the chance to present their findings at national and international conferences and were delighted when one of their pieces of work, on optimising urine samples, was published with co-first authorship. View the article on the MDPI website.
The two student doctors wanted to extend their thanks to co-authors Professor Chris Probert, Dr Elinor Chapman, Professor Mark Boyd, and Dr Seamus Coyle for all of their support in the process.
Congratulations James and Prashant!