Health Science Researchers are ‘Off the Starting Blocks’

Posted on: 11 February 2016

The Faculty of Health Sciences Research Initiatives Fund, launched by the Faculty of Health Sciences in September, announced the winners at an event in TBSI this week.

The fund is specifically designed to support new and innovative research that will enhance Trinity and the Faculty of Health Science’s ability to compete for large-scale, interdisciplinary, single and multi-investigator extramural awards.

The Dean of Health Sciences, Professor Mary McCarron, has invested €157,000 in eight projects for early-stage researchers across the faculty. This is the inaugural year of the fund, which hopes to run every year from now on.

The eight winners are as follows:

• Dr Anna Shore (School of Dental Science, School of Medicine)

Tracking the emergence and spread of a community-associated MRSA clone in Irish hospitals using whole-genome sequencing.

• Dr Jean Fletcher (School of Medicine, School of Biochemistry & Immunology)

Immune profiling in ALS – a novel precision medicine tool.

• Dr Maria Jose Santos-Martinez (School of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences, School of Medicine)

lnvestigating the role of Kynurenine on tumour cell-platelet interactions.

• Dr Fiona Wilson (School of Medicine)

An exploration of the utility of a smartphone application to collect ECG field data in competitive rowers.

• Dr Sinead Smith (School of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences, School of Medicine)

Targeting notch signalling in gastro-intestinal inflammation.

• Dr Mary O’Sullivan (School of Medicine)

Leveraging autophagy to direct an inhaled TB vaccine to dendritic cell autophagosomes for better antigen presentation.

• Dr Máire O’Dwyer (School of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences)

Drug burden index to define the functional burden of medicines in older adults with intellectual disabilities and older adults with multimorbidity

• Dr John Dinsmore (School of Nursing & Midwifery)

Way finding – development and validation of an assistive navigation tool for Individuals with mild cognitive impairment, early on-set dementia or intellectual disability.

Dean of Health Sciences Professor Mary McCarron commented: “This was the inaugural call and we were overwhelmed by the response. The Faculty had committed to awarding five bursaries of up to €20,000, but given the volume of very strong applications, we sourced additional funding to extend this to eight bursaries for this year only. The spirit of the award is to get our early stage researchers off the starting block.”

Associate Dean of Research Professor Peter Gallagher further added: “I received a small research award when I first started in Trinity, the data from which led to a very significant publication. Therefore I am delighted to see the Faculty of Health Sciences support their researchers in this way.”

You can read more about the bursaries and about research in the Faculty of Health Sciences here: www.healthsciences.tcd.ie/research/