Postdoctoral Scholar in Molecular Engineering, University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering Dr. Abhimanyu Thakur, PhD, is a biomedical scientist who loves to dig into scientific research questions and invent feasible solutions to broadly pertinent scientific questions with multidisciplinary methods. In particular, he is working to better understand the role of exosomes in diverse aspects of science, including cancer biology, theranostic, and stem cell biology. Exosomes are nanovesicles (30-200 nm) found in extracellular space of various cell types, and in biofluids; having diverse functions including intracellular communication in physiological as well as pathological conditions. Dr. Thakur has expertise in exosome, cancer research, biosensing, drug delivery, neurodegenerative diseases, and biomedical applications of machine learning. He holds three patents and his research work have been published in top-tier peer-reviewed scientific journals, including Science Advances (IF: 14.14), Nature Communication (IF: 14.92), Protein and Cell (IF: 15.328), Biosensors and Bioelectronics (IF: 12.545), Bioactive Materials (IF: 14.119), Advance Functional Materials (IF: 19.92), Chemical Engineering Journal (IF: 16.744), Journal of Biomedical Sciences (IF: 12.771), CNS Neuroscience & Therapeutics (IF: 7.035), and Brain Behavior Immunity (IF: 19.23). His honors include prestigious awards or grants including UChicago CORE Grant Award, National Science Foundation Funded I-Corp at Polsky, University of Chicago, a Young Investigator Award by American Association for Cancer Research, Korean Cancer Association, Global Young Scientists Summit Award by Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, the Chow Yei Ching Research Award, and Outstanding Academic Performance Award by the City University of Hong Kong.
Assistant Professor of Molecular Engineering, University of Chicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering Specialized in tissue engineering and stem cell biology, the Joyce Chen Lab applies technical advances (e.g. human pluripotent stem cell-based modeling, organotypic tissue engineering and single cell analysis) to pursue long-standing questions in cancer research, stem cell biology and regenerative medicine. Our current main focus is to understand how cancers initiate and progress using various stages of human cells derived from pluripotent or adult stem cells, and design strategies to diagnose, categorize and treat the diseases more effectively. Another line of our work is to directly model and study human tissues or diseases “in a dish”, by in vivo molecule-mediated humanized mouse models, ex vivo organotypic re-cellularization or in vitro microfabrication. The Chen group’s research interest is to integrate stem cell-based disease modeling, regenerative technologies, and single cell analysis to study organ damage repair, regenerative medicine, cancer, and other genetic diseases.
Sustainability Researcher, Queen's University, Ontario I am Sustainability Researcher with other 15 years of work experience. Over the years, I have worked with several international development agencies including the Government of Tanzania and international development organizations including The World-Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), German Development Agency (GIZ), and Pathfinder International and others where I was engaged in programs management, monitoring and evaluation, research, policy advisory for the development of forestry, agriculture and renewable energy sectors in Tanzania. In research, I have a passion for and interest in agriculture-food related research with a focus on small-scale farming systems in Africa. My broad areas of interest are to explore how policies can propel agriculture innovations (technologies) and their adoption, acceptance, and use among under-resourced farmers of Sub-Saharan Africa. As a researcher, I employ qualitative techniques to explore and understand socially and economically sound solutions addressing day to day livelihood and environmental challenges of rural communities. I am also a Founder of MAVUNO LAB, one of the first post-harvest innovation centers based in Morogoro, Tanzania, with a mission to develop low cost and affordable technologies, products, and services to mitigate post-harvest food losses in Tanzania. We work with young graduate engineers to design and come up with affordable solution to prevent and reduce food loss and waste in Tanzania.
Senior Lecturer of Psychology, Royal Holloway University of London I am Director of the MSc in Applied Neuroscience - taking applications now! https://www.royalholloway.ac.uk/studying-here/ I am Director of the Virtual Reality Lab, joint between Psychology, Computer Science and Electronic Engineering at Royal Holloway University of London. My research is focused on human visual perception and attention, using eye tracking, fMRI, EEG, virtual reality and computational modelling. My background is interdisciplinary training in Mathematics in areas of Biology for my PhD, which resulted in my work on empirical and computational investigations of space and time representation in humans. My recent work is concerned mainly with spatial exploration and representation in 3D space. This has included projects on attention guidance in 360 degrees with tech production companies. I have recently received funding for a project using eye tracking combined with agents to guide attention in multi-tasking situations. I have recently supervised PhD projects on the use of depth if field to guide attention, using eye tracking data from social media to predict personality and situation awareness in remote operators. I am also working on the biological mechanisms involved in combining eye and head movements in 360 degree visual search.
PhD Candidate in the Nutrition, Psychopharmacology & Brain Development Unit, University of Salford I am a second-year PhD student researching food insecurity (lack of access to healthy and nutritious food) and obesity. More specifically, my research looks at childhood food insecurity and its impact on adulthood eating behaviours. During my time as a master's student, I was able to publish one journal article https://www.ijmar.org/v9n2/22-006.html
Professor in Rail Strategy, University of Birmingham Former CEO, board director and economist with experience in policy, business strategy, transport, infrastructure and change. Now using that experience as a professor, non-executive director and mentor to help individuals or organisations make a difference in areas which matter for our society.
