Rhiannon Boseley, Karina Khambatta and Ashley Hollings.

Three PhD students linked with the Curtin Health Innovation Research Institute (CHIRI) recently scored prizes at two national symposia.

Ashley Hollings.

CHIRI PhD Student Ashley Hollings won second place in the Student Talk category at the Australian Society for Molecular Imaging (ASMI) 2018 Scientific Meeting. Ashley then went on to achieve third place in the Australian Synchrotron User Meeting (ASUM) 2018 Poster Slam. Ashley is supervised by Dr Mark Hackett (School of Molecular and Life Sciences & CHIRI), Dr Tom Becker (School of Molecular and Life Sciences) and CHIRI Director Professor John Mamo (School of Public Health).

Further awards were received by two additional students supervised by Dr Hackett, who have been collaborating with CHIRI researchers and using the state-of-the-art microscopy platforms at CHIRI. Rhiannon Boseley took out first place for Best Poster and second place in the Poster Slam at the ASUM, and Karina Khambatta won the prize for best student poster at AMSI. Karina and Rhiannon have used the fluorescence microscopy suite at CHIRI to study biomolecular distributions, which complement X-ray and infrared imaging experiments they performed at the Australian Synchrotron.

Rhiannon Boseley.

CHIRI researcher Dr Mark Hackett, who is thrilled with their achievements, is a supervisor for all three students from Curtin’s School of Molecular and Life Sciences. Karina Khambatta is also supervised by Dr Alan Payne (School of Molecular and Life Sciences), and Rhiannon Boseley is supervised by Professor Simon Lewis (School of Molecular and Life Sciences).

This year’s ASMI meeting was in Perth on 20-21 November and the ASUM on 22-23 November in Melbourne.

The ASMI symposia brings together researchers from a wide range of disciplines interested in the development and applications of multi-modality molecular imaging. Other topics covered include novel molecular imaging probes and applications of molecular imaging in neuroscience, cardiology, metabolic disorders and cancer.

The ASUM showcases some of the best research and investigations undertaken at the Australian Synchrotron facility and provides its user community with updates on the latest developments and technical advances in synchrotron science. Mark was a presenter at this year’s event.