RECENT NEWS

Measurement uncertainty in the context of clinical laboratories is inextricably linked to imprecision, and therefore the assessment of this poorly understood factor is an increasing element of the accreditation process. In view of the need to provide some clarity, Pathology in Practice is running a series of articles written by Stephen MacDonald.

Last year the Francis Crick Institute moved into a brand new building in central London, bringing together 1500 scientists and support staff working collaboratively across disciplines, making it the largest biomedical research facility in Europe under a single roof. As the Francis Crick Institute is a biomedical discovery institute dedicated to understanding the fundamental biology underlying health and disease, it is vital that it has very reliable and secure freezers to enable it to undertake its research effectively and safely.

The British Society for Microbial Technology (BSMT) is offering an excellent programme for its annual scientific conference, to be held on Friday, 14 May 2017 in London. This year, the relevance of microbiology to the clinician and life-threatening clinical infections will be explored in Hot Topics in Microbiology – Join the Grapevine.

World Parkinson’s Disease Day (11 April) is held every year on Parkinson’s birthday to raise awareness of the eponymous disease and the research being done to alleviate the condition. To mark 200 years since James Parkinson first identified the condition, a new biography of this forgotten man will be published.

A range of clinical trials aimed at developing new treatments for pancreatic cancer will get underway after a £10 million investment from Cancer Research UK. The investment will support the PRECISION Panc project, which aims to develop personalised treatments for pancreatic cancer patients, improving the options and outcomes for a disease in which survival rates have remained stubbornly low.

Researchers have generated the first immortalised cell lines that allow more-efficient manufacture of red blood cells. The results, published in Nature Communications (Trakarnsanga K, Griffiths RE, Wilson MC et al. An immortalized adult human erythroid line facilitates sustainable and scalable generation of functional red cells. Nat Commun 2017 Mar 14; 8: 14750. doi: 10.1038/ncomms14750) could, if successfully tested in clinical trials, lead to a safe source of transfusions for people with rare blood types, and in areas of the world where blood supplies are inadequate or unsafe.

Professor Andrew Morris has been appointed director of the new UK health and biomedical informatics research institute, which is to be named Health Data Research UK (HDR UK). The new institute will, for the first time, incorporate on a national scale the entire breadth of data science research aimed at improving human health.

Ranjit Rai is probably the longest serving and most widely travelled laboratory autoclave service engineer working out of Britain. He joined Priorclave within months of its formation, building autoclaves before becoming the company’s only service engineer providing customer support across the UK. Shortly after his appointment as service manager, Ranjit celebrated 25 years with the company.

It lives inside one-third of the UK population and is a common infection in cats; however, scientists previously knew little about how the Toxoplasma parasite communicated with its host. Now, new research by the University of Glasgow’s Wellcome Centre for Molecular Parasitology, in collaboration with The University of Vermont, has revealed how the parasite uses a key protein to form a communication network and ultimately continue the infection process.

A recent time and motion study by University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust has demonstrated a 1.5 minute (>20%) reduction in time to blood gas results when using the Proxima bedside blood gas monitoring system from Sphere Medical. The results were presented at the British Association of Critical Care Nurses conference and Intensive Care Society State of the Art meeting as a scientific poster.

An educational board game to help improve team performance in health and social care organisations has been developed by Focus Games in collaboration with NHS Lothian.

Arquer Diagnostics, the developer of a high-sensitivity, high-specificity, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA)-based urine test for bladder cancer, has recruited 801 patients for a clinical trial to evaluate the company’s MCM5 bladder cancer diagnostics test. The results from the study will be used as part of the company’s application for CE mark approval, ahead of the commercial launch of the MCM5 ELISA planned for later in the year.

Globally recognised as a symbol of design excellence, the iF design awards celebrate the best in user-focused, ergonomic and efficient design. With over 5000 submissions from 70 countries, Olympus Scientific Solutions has received two of these prestigious awards for its CX23 upright microscope and FLUOVIEW FV3000 confocal laser scanning microscope.

The rise of antibiotic resistance is at the heart of a new BBC drama, written by Val McDermid and shaped by scientific expertise from the University of Warwick. Airing on BBC Radio 4 this month (3, 10 and 17 March, 2.15 pm), Resistance is a three-part story about an epidemic of a drug-resistant disease.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP), Sakura Finetek and other partners have opened a state-of-the-art histopathology laboratory in Butaro, Rwanda, providing patients in resource-limited areas of the country with access to rapid cancer diagnostics and appropriate care and treatment.

The Cancer Research Technology (CRT) Pioneer Fund has invested in the development of a promising new class of drugs for blood cancer. The funding will support Cancer Research UK scientists at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, who are designing the drugs, to treat patients with diffuse large B‐cell lymphoma (pictured), a subtype of non‐Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Researchers at The Institute of Cancer Research (ICR), London, are taking advantage of the single-cell encapsulation capabilities of Dolomite Bio’s Single Cell RNASeq system to investigate resistance mechanisms in prostate cancer. Karolina Nowakowska, a PhD student at ICR, explained: “Our team is focused on studying treatment resistance in prostate cancer patients, looking at the biochemical mechanisms responsible. My project is based on using single-cell sequencing to help identify the specific genes which lead to treatment resistance, trying to identify biomarkers and, in the longer term, treatments that will allow a more personalised approach to therapy.”

Researchers from the Harold C Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center at UT Southwestern Medical Center have found that high expression of a gene called SHOX2 predicts poor survival in intermediate grade gliomas. This potential biomarker for glioma, a common type of brain cancer, could help clinicians determine how aggressive a cancer is, and help to determine the best course of treatment.

The shape of bacteria does not influence how well they can move. This is the surprising finding of new research which could have major implications for the future of the scientific and medical industries. Published in Nature’s new Ecology & Evolution journal, the results refute long-held theories that there should be a strong link between the evolution of shape in bacteria and their ability to move.

Beckman Coulter has appointed Ed Harris as its new product manager for IT in Northern Europe. As a product expert with a passion for healthcare and a vision of the benefits that IT can bring to patient outcomes through enhanced efficiencies, Ed is responsible for overseeing Beckman Coulter’s clinical information systems portfolio. He will also drive the company’s IT strategy and product innovation in order to advance healthcare for all stakeholders. In particular, he will ensure the effective support of clinical laboratory managers in their drive for efficiency and quality.