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Dr Chibeza Agley and CamBioScience hosted several successful workshops at the College in 2016, including this on genome editing technology.
CamBioScience is an academic-to-industry consultancy firm. Its overarching mission is to better connect the worlds of Bioscience industry and academia by creating mutually beneficial knowledge transfer, fostering innovation and creating new commercial opportunities in the Life Sciences. In April the efforts of Dr Agley and CamBioScience were recognised on the Today programme on BBC Radio 4. 2016 has also been a year of grant funding success for researchers. Molecular Biologist Dr David Kent was awarded European Research Council Starting Grant for a project entitled Understanding the Physical Biology of Adult Blood Stem Cells. This grant will fund a five-year research project which aims to apply novel physical and quantitative biological approaches to understand blood stem cell expansion and evolution of stem cell based diseases in the blood system. The value of the grant is 1.5 million euros. These are just a selection of the highlights in what has been a strong and innovative year for research at Homerton. We look forward to building this momentum in 2017 n
ANNUAL REVIEW RESEARCH
and use domestic political discourse, as opposed to arguments about international law, to scrutinise the government’s case for armed conflict. The panel was attended by serving members of the Lords and Commons and by parliamentary clerks as well as interested academics. July saw Homerton MCR forging academic links with their counterparts at Harris Manchester College, Oxford through the Graduate Research Day. During this event, organised by Graduate Tutor Dr Melanie Keene, eleven students gave conference-style presentations about their doctoral research to an audience of Fellows and postgraduate students. A wide range of topics were covered including: group modelling with spaghetti and marshmallows, legal definitions of types of sea, the genetic sequencing of blended worms, the varied linguistic uses of emojis, and the role of monsters in young adult novels. The event was a success and will alternate between Homerton and Harris Manchester in future years. Throughout the year the relationship between College and biomedicine has continued to develop and thrive. Our Research Associate Dr Chibeza Agley has continued to develop novel biotechnological tools for stem cells with broad applications for the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry. He has recently received support to patent one of his inventions with Cambridge Enterprise. In his capacity as CEO of CamBioScience Limited Dr Agley and his team provided professional training in breakthrough life science technologies to more than 150 professional scientists from 50 institutions and 20 countries worldwide. CamBioScience Limited is a privately owned Life Sciences Company with bases in Cambridge (UK) and London.