Our webinar “Achievements of GCRF START” was chaired by one of our grant Co-Investigators, Professor Sir Richard Catlow, the Foreign Secretary at The Royal Society and an eminent scientist.
This grant has ensured that over 80 researchers have collaborated across continents and resulted in over 50 publications linked to the UN sustainable development goals.
During the meeting we shared some of our achievements, early career impacts and the importance of Diamond’s collaboration.
Detailed agenda
| 11:00 – 11:10 | Welcome by Professor Sir Richard Catlow – GCRF START Co-Investigator, Professor at Cardiff University, University College London and Foreign Secretary at The Royal Society | |
| Energy Materials Achievements | ||
| 11:10 – 11:30 | Success of START from South Africa by Professor Michael Claeys – GCRF START Co-Investigator and Professor at University of Cape Town | |
| 11:30 – 11:40 | Early Careers by Dr Mohamed Fadlalla – GCRF START Post Doctoral Research Associate and Lecturer and Research Officer at University of Cape Town | |
| 11:40 – 11:50 | Importance of Diamonds’ collaboration by Dr Sofia Diaz-Moreno – GCRF START Co-Investigator and Science Group Leader – Spectroscopy Group at Diamond Light Source | |
| Structural Biology Achievements | ||
| 11:50 – 12:10 | Success of START from South Africa by Professor Erick Strauss – GCRF START Co-Investigator and Professor at Stellenbosch University | |
| 12:10 – 12:20 | Early Careers by Dr Carmien Tolmie – GCRF START Post Doctoral Research Associate and Lecturer at University of the Free State | |
| 12:20 – 12:30 | Importance of Diamonds’ collaboration by Dr Gwyndaf Evans – GCRF START Co-Investigator and Deputy Director – Life Sciences at Diamond Light Source | |
| 12:30 – 12:40 | Break | |
| 12:40 – 12:55 | Overview from the funders by Dr Jason Green – Associate Director, External Innovations, Science and Technology Facilities Council | |
| 12:55 – 13:15 | Overview by Professor Chris Nicklin – GCRF START Principal Investigator and Science Group Leader – Structures and Surfaces Group at Diamond Light Source | |
| 13:15 – 13:30 | Closing remarks with Q&A by Professor Sir Richard Catlow |
A recording of the event will be available in due course.
GCRF START Structural Biology and Energy Materials Collaboration Meeting
Structural Biology and Energy Materials collaboration meeting – an opportunity to share research achievements/ results within subject areas
Date: 21st May 2021
How START has enabled Research over the last 3 years
10:30 – 10:35 Introduction Chris Nicklin
10:35 – 10:55 Talk by Michael Claeys (Energy Materials)
10:55 – 11:15 Talk by Erick Strauss (Structural Biology)
How START projects have helped Academic progression
11:15 – 11:35 Talk by Mohamed Fadlalla (Energy Materials)
11:35 – 11:55 Talk by Carmien Tolmie (Structural Biology)
Panel discussion
12:50 – 13:20 Q&A session with START Leadership Team
South African Biophysics Workshop 2021
The South African Biophysics Workshop took place on 22nd February to 5th March 2021. For more information please visit the website – Biophysics Workshop.
START Bioscience Check-in Theme -” How did lockdown affect my experience as a START contributor – what I managed to accomplish”
Virtual (Zoom) meeting organised from (Johannesburg, South Africa) on 15th October 2020.
Meeting organised to discuss science still being accomplished even with Lockdown:
- Jeremy Woodward UCT – Shotgun EM of mycobacterial protein complexes
- Dirk Opperman and Carmien Tolmie, UFS – Structural Biology in Middle Earth
- Anton Hamman, US – Using chemical stress to boost the yield of a soluble recombinant protein, SaDPCK, and updates on the crystal structures of SaPanK
- Thandeka Moyo, NICD – HIV and SARS-CoV-2 infection: understanding antibodies for prevention
- Lizelle Lubbe, UCT – Unlocking an ACE structure under lockdown
- Wolf-Dieter Schubert, UP – Pandemic protein progress in Pretoria
- Ramesh Pandian and Ikechukwu Achilonu, Wits – Success stories with Schistosoma japonicum GST and HIV protease
GCRF START Early Career Scientists Meeting – 2nd Session – explaining how a synchrotron works
Virtual (Zoom) meeting held on 1st July 2020.
Lorraine Bobb, Head of the Beam Diagnostics Group at Diamond will share her knowledge about how the accelerator at Diamond works, to produce the bright beams of x-rays that we all rely on. We will then show you how to do a virtual tour of Diamond, allowing you to explore the facility wherever you are in the world.
GCRF START Early Career Scientists Meeting – 1st Session (Introduction)
Virtual (Zoom) meeting held on 4th June 2020.
An opportunity for Early Career Scientists to meet and introduce themselves to one another and discuss their research, share knowledge and experiences.
Instruct Eric/ START – Furthering Structural Biology in Africa webinar
Webinar held on 24th March 2020.
Instruct-ERIC is the European Research Infrastructure for Structural Biology, providing training and access to high-end structural biology facilities through our centres of excellence. This event was organised together with the GCRF START project and aimed to further the relationship between Instruct-ERIC and structural biologists and other life scientists in South Africa. Ed Sturrock, one of our GCRF START investigators gave a talk entitled: “The development of novel ACE inhibitors for the treatment of hypertension and heart failure.”
GCRF START Energy Material Meeting
GCRF START held this meeting at the University of Cape Town, (South Africa) on the 16th – 17th December 2019.
The meeting took the opportunity to review of current project successes through a series of presentations given by the UK and South African Energy Materials investigators and PDRA’s. Discussions took place regarding future activities, and planning, with a focus of what the team wants to achieve from the project, and how we intend to implement and deliver. Discussions around beamtime access/ applications and processes also covering areas where we can provide support as a collaborative unit.
“Touring the catalysis labs at Cape Town University was fascinating – I was very impressed with the very strong industrial links that supports much of the work and the technical innovation displayed at addressing the scientific challenges being investigated.”
DANIEL BOWRON, INVITED SPEAKER, UKRI SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY FACILITIES COUNCIL (UNITED KINGDOM)
Credit Rebekka Stredwick. © Diamond Light Source
Erick Strass Presentation
Entitled Enzymology in action: Picking apart a new weapon in the epic immune battle between neutrophils and Staphylococcus aureus at Diamond Light Source Ltd (Harwell, United Kingdom) on 12th November 2019.
A great opportunity to hear about both the great science, and some of the experience we have had building a large, international collaboration. Also an opportunity to update colleagues and collaborators about Life Science in the GCRF-START grant 18 months into the project, discussing project progress and future plans.
MX User Training in Pretoria
Collaborative training event with Diamond Light Source and GCRF START at University of Pretoria (Pretoria, South Africa) on 11th July 2019.
Organisers: Dave Hall, Carmien Tolmie, Wolf-Dieter Schubert
X-ray crystallography data collection training workshop for members of the South African crystallography BAG (Diamond Block Allocation Grant) presented by beamline scientists from Diamond. Attended by START PDRAs and other members of START labs, including academic staff, postgraduate students and postdoctoral fellows.
‘Introduction to Cryo-EM’ Biophysics and Structural Biology at Synchrotrons Workshop
GCRF START held the workshop at the University of Cape Town, (South Africa) on the 15th – 18th January 2019.
The workshop was presented by researchers from the UK and South Africa with international attendees. The scope of the workshop included protein sample preparation, crystallization, data collection, data processing and interpretation. Apart for X-ray crystallography, included other structural techniques, such as cryo-electron microscopy, X-ray microscopy and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. Several case studies were presented and gave students an understanding of how science happened in the “real world” and there was ample opportunity to share experiences of the development of science at and around synchrotrons from the perspective of users from countries having widely varying economies.
“My highlight was the ‘Introduction to Cryo-EM’ Biophysics & Structural Biology at Synchrotron’s Workshop in January 2019. This workshop was a blast of new information and a fantastic introduction to the field of structural biology.“
Phillip Venter, PhD Student at University of Cape Town (South Africa)
The GCRF – START Launch event
START held its launch event at St. Catherine’s College, Oxford (United Kingdom) on the 27th – 28th March 2019.
The event included invited guests from the START participating organisations and other interested researchers coming together to share their research achieved now the project has run for about a year. Sessions included presentations on the opportunities provided by synchrotron technology in support of the research disciplines START supports and enabled very stimulating discussions on current and future directions.
“Seeing the Diamond facility and meeting the staff myself was empowering and truly impressive.”
Alberdina Aike van Dijk, Professor / Principal Investigator and GCRF START Co-Investigator, North West University (South Africa)
Programme agenda – for the GCRF START launch event is available here:
Photograph By: Sean Dillow. http://www.TheBigCheesePhotography.co.uk
© Diamond Light Source.
Professor Bryan Sewell: Condition of Structural Biology in South Africa.
Photograph By: Sean Dillow. http://www.TheBigCheesePhotography.co.uk
© Diamond Light Source.
The GCRF START Kick-off Meeting – Structural Biology and Material Science
START held its kick-off meeting at the University of Witwatersrand (Johannesburg, South Africa) on the 18th – 19th September 2018.
The event covered the strategic discussions on the layout of GCRF START, and on navigating the funding, future collaborations, education and project outreach. While researchers from both Structural Biology and Material Science use synchrotron techniques, the two fields mainly operate in isolation. This meeting provided an interface for researchers from various institutions and from both disciplines, not only to learn about each other’s work, but also to get to know the researchers in person. A series of presentations were delivered showing diversity with synchrotron techniques used. The event provided a platform for all to liaise and utilise the opportunity to discuss future data collections at Diamond Light Sources’ Synchrotron.
“The launch event marks the formal beginning of the START project, where both the African and UK investigators are excited to learn about each other’s research and the possibility of working together to make use of synchrotron techniques in the field of structural biology and energy materials. I, personally, cannot wait to see the first results come out of the collaborations that we are enabling.”
Professor Chris Nicklin, (START Principal Investigator, Diamond Light Source Ltd (UK))