Pharmacy PhD student Jack Taylor recently presented his research on microparticles at the Cold Spring Harbor Asis Conference in Suzhour, China [opens an external link].
Taylor joined 100 other delegates as well as key opinion leaders on the topic of extracellular vesicles. While all other attending researchers presented on exosomes, Taylor was the sole researcher presenting on microparticles - namely the enzymatic and cell membrane factors regulating microparticle biogenesis in malignant cells.
Microparticles are small, membrane fragments that are released from all cell types including in cancer cell populations.
Taylor's supervisor, Associate Professor Mary Bebawy, and her team were the first to identify microparticles as crucial mediators in conferring multidrug resistance and metastatic capacity in tumour cell populations.
Taylor's project is aimed at understanding how these microparticles are formed and shed from malignant and non-malignant cells, in the hope that a cancer specific pathway that serves as a novel therapeutic target for circumvention of deleterious cancer traits can be defined.
At the conference, Taylor presented a poster session and engaged in deep discussions with other researchers.
"I had some very informative discussions about my work. I formed new connections that will hopefully materialise collaborations in the future. To my surprise, I was able to help other researchers in the same way," said Taylor.
"There is something to be said about the mutual exchange of ideas between colleagues new and old."
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