A north-east graduate has made a potentially important contribution for identifying diseases in Latin American countries.
Eden Burnett, 23, was celebrating receiving her MSc Microbiology degree from Aberdeen University yesterday.
Ms Burnett, who grew up in Craigdam, is currently in patenting talks after the promising success of her final project.
She said: “I really can’t say much, but it’s ongoing discussions about patenting.
“It has something to do with my peptide sequence and this could be used for a marker for disease in countries like Latin America, that sort of region, for Chagas disease.”
The illness, also known as American trypanosomiasis, infects about six to seven million people worldwide.
When infected, symptoms include skin lesions, fever, headaches, difficulty breathing and abdominal or chest pains and, later in life, it could result in sudden death.
Ms Burnett will soon start her role as a research and development scientist in Stirling.
She said: “I will be working with point of care. What that means is, instead of going to get a blood test at your GP, all you would need is a little machine with a few drops of your blood.
“My job would be to make a disease profile with the few drops of blood.
“You would know, within a couple of minutes, whether you have a disease or not.
“It’s a brand new concept, really.”
Portskerra Aberdeen University graduate, Katya Mackenzie, lands rare role with NHS Highland
A Portskerra graduate, who is one of the first physician associates in the north, has celebrated earning her master’s degree.
Katya Mackenzie decided to continue her studies at Aberdeen University after completing an undergraduate degree in physiology.
The 28-year-old has since successfully landed a role as a trainee physician associate with NHS Highland and is one of three for the area.
She said: “The role is relatively new and we’re the first in NHS Highland.
“We are essentially medical providers and it’s been around for less than 10 years.
“As physician associates, we see patients, take histories, do certain procedures and recommend treatment plans.
“It’s an additional role to the medical work team.
“I stayed at Aberdeen University because I knew the staff and the team here, but then decided to make the move to NHS Highland since it was close to home – which is nice.”
Ms Mackenzie said her reason for choosing the MSc in Physician Associate Science was for the “variety”.
“What inspired me to the role was that there was so much variety and options.
“I didn’t have to choose one speciality or area to work in.
“I worked with the orthopaedics trauma in Aberdeen and got to meet physician associates.
“It gave me the chance to see them in the ward and the different specialities you could work in.”
For other students from the Highlands and Islands, Ms Mackenzie said she would encourage anyone considering studying at Aberdeen University to do it.
“I had such a busy life in Aberdeen Universtiy, I was here nine years.
“I was on the dance society and played on rugby team. I have made friends here who are friends for life and were here supporting me.
“There’s always people from Caithness – you’re always going to bump into people you know.
“And it’s just such a friendly university.”
Aberdeen graduate praises university community following move from Italy
A graduate, who made the move from Italy to the Granite City, is now taking the next step of his career to Oxford University.
Federico Caso, 24, celebrated his MSc in genetics after making Aberdeen his home for the last five years.
He said: “I thought Aberdeen was a great city to study science and I came here right after graduating from high school.
“I did an undergraduate course in biology before deciding to stay and pursue a postgraduate in genetics.
“My dissertation focused on genetic modification and used this to study diseases in humans.”
Mr Caso added that making the transition from the Mediterranean was difficult at first, but he eventually fell in love with the north-east’s countryside.
He said: “It was quite cold at the beginning, but I quickly got used to it.
“It was such a different environment from back home, but it was really nice to have the university’s community and other students.
“I find you don’t really get this in Italy, which is amazing.
“I loved the countryside. My girlfriend is from Balmedie so we were able to see so much of Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire.
“I got to actually see the area from a local’s perspective, which was great.”
He has now moved from Sunnybank, Aberdeen to Oxford where he is a clinical medicine PhD student.
He said: “I am now moving on to study at Oxford. I have been there a little more than a month now and it’s been intense.
“But it has been a lot of fun so far. The PhD is on clinical medicine and genome engineering to study for possible applications to humans.”
Keith graduate lands prestigious psychology prize
A Keith woman who was awarded a prestigious prize for best final year project has graduated with an MSc in health psychology.
Jo Strathdee, 25, graduated yesterday with distinction and has also received the Marie Johnston Research Prize.
The award is offered in name of Professor Marie Johnston, an Emeritus Professor at the Aberdeen University and a founding figure in UK health psychology.
It is given to the best final year project and Ms Strathdee bagged it with her look into different “health-related behaviours”.
She said: “I was totally shocked to receive the award.
“I basically looked into the association of different health-related behaviours that have happened, will happen and see how they are all connected.
“For instance, there are a few topics that are quite prevalent in health psychology at the moment.
“These include diabetes, obesity, smoking cessation.
“My degree is what I will eventually be doing which is to continue to improve their health behaviours – or maybe work with people who have chronic conditions and life-changing conditions.
“As a health psychologist, I can work with them to better their life or manage it.”
Adjusting to Aberdeen after moving from Keith, she said was it was “close enough to home, but also far away”.
“At the time, that was right for me.
“I have met amazing people. If there’s anything I can take from this experience is the friends for life I have made,” she said.
“It was a really interesting degree and I have now specialised a little bit further in my field.”
Ms Strathdee is looking to further herself in the field and will apply to become a fully qualified health psychologist.
