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INVESTING in POLLINATOR RESEARCH Protecting Insect Pollinators’ Health – and Our Food Supply

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INVESTING in POLLINATOR RESEARCH Protecting Insect Pollinators’ Health – and Our Food Supply Issue 66, spring 2011 Wellcome NEWS INVESTING IN POLLINATOR RESEARCH Protecting insect pollinators’ health – and our food supply. Technology Transfer Technology 14 Beautiful creatures: Transfer: Lainson and his parasites Pushing the CONTENTS Designed and manufactured by Aircraft Medical Designed and manufactured by Aircraft The McGRATH® Series 5 video laryngoscope, developed with Trust funding. Series 5 video laryngoscope, developed with Trust The McGRATH® boundaries INSIDE THIS ISSUE In brief of medical Message from the Director 4 Funding news 6 We are a committed funder of Research news 8 translational R&D, bridging the gap between fundamental research In depth innovation and the development of new health products. How I Got Into… cancer genetics: Prof. Mike Stratton 10 We work with world-class Beautiful creatures: Prof. Ralph Lainson 14 investigators in academic institutions The dirty truth: Dirt at Wellcome Collection 20 and companies alike, in pursuit of YouTube and blog update 24 solutions for unmet medical needs. Q&A: Dr Beau Lotto 25 Protecting the pollinators 28 Opinion Museums need more compelling games 13 Appliance of Science: bringing real life into art 34 Picture features Wellcome Image Awards 2011 22 Nuts and Bolts: primary cilia 26 From the Archive: Nuremberg Chronicle 32 www.wellcome.ac.uk/technologytransfer 2 | WELLCOME NEWS SPRING 2011 | 3 WellcomeNEWS MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTOR Telling the stories of the Wellcome Trust’s work SIR MARK WALPORT UKCMRI plans approved Editor Chrissie Giles Plans to build a world-leading medical research institute at St Pancras in Assistant Editor Tom Freeman London have been approved by Camden councillors. The UK Centre for Writers Craig Brierley, Chrissie Giles, Mun-Keat Looi, Jen Middleton Medical Research and Innovation (UKCMRI), designed by the architects Design Malcolm Chivers, Marianne Dear HOK with PLP Architecture, will have around 1500 staff , including 1250 Photography David Sayer scientists. The Development Control Committee voted in favour of the Publisher Hugh Blackbourn £500 million project on 16 December 2010. Contributors: Sir David Cooksey, Ch airman of UKCMRI, says: “UKCMRI Mike Stratton illustration Bret Syfert will harness the talent and potential of doctors, nurses, biologists, Primary cilium illustration Lucy Farfort mathematicians, physicists, chemists, computer scientists and engineers Ideas, comments, suggestions? Get in touch: to understand the underlying causes of disease. This will accelerate our Wellcome News ability to treat disease – bringing benefi ts to patients through the NHS Wellcome Trust Gibbs Building and to the economy by developing a sector in which the UK already 215 Euston Road excels.” We are co-founders of UKCMRI, in partnership w ith the Medical London NW1 2BE Research Council, Cancer Research UK and University College London. E [email protected] www.wellcome.ac.uk/wellcomenews Construction is expected to begin this year, and to be completed by 2015. To subscribe: www.ukcmri.ac.uk T +44 (0)20 7611 8651 E [email protected] www.wellcome.ac.uk/subscribe Impression of the UKCRMI entrance atrium. Wadsworth3d All images, unless otherwise stated, are from the Wellcome Library. You can get copies through The Wellcome Trust supports and forms partnerships with a includes events on 28 April and 5 May. Wellcome Images (images.wellcome.ac.uk). Library welcomes diverse range of people working on an equally diverse range of topics. Dirty work On 8 April, the whole building will be Wellcome Trust However, there is a common denominator that unites everyone with taken over by ‘Elements’. This event, Head of Discovery We are a global charitable foundation dedicated to achieving whom we work – a passion for their work. In this, the fi rst issue of the at Wellcome curated by chemist Andrea Sella and In January the Wellcome Library extraordinary improvements in human and animal health. We welcomed Dr Vicki Porter as support the brightest minds in biomedical research and the new-look Wellcome News, we are proud to be able to bring you some author Hugh Aldersey-Williams, will medical humanities. Our breadth of support includes public stories of these people and what drives them to succeed. Collection allow visitors to explore the Janus-like Head of Discovery and engagement, education and the application of research to improve As Mike Stratton, Director of the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute The doors have now closed on Wellcome qualities of some elements, including Engagement. Dr Porter will be health. We are independent of both political and commercial responsible for transforming and co-leader of the Cancer Genome Project, tells us, his fascination Collection’s High Society exhibition – its arsenic, mercury, oxygen and iodine. interests. www.wellcome.ac.uk audience strategy, including most successful to date – but there’s a www.wellcomecollection.org with cancer began early in his career, when as a pathologist he would fi nding new ways for people to This is an open access publication and, with the exception of look down a microscope to diagnose cancer. This fascination has driven wealth of events coming up in the spring. images and illustrations, the content may, unless otherwise stated, get involved with the work and be reproduced free of charge in any format or medium, subject to his career, and the Institute that he now heads is working to understand Replacing High Society is Dirt: The fi lthy the resources of the Library. She the following constraints: content must be reproduced accurately; the genetic changes behind the cancers he used to examine. reality of everyday life (see page 20). There joins from the J Paul Getty Trust in content must not be used in a misleading context; the Wellcome It was a similar passion for the microscopic world that took will be a series of events around Dirt, Los Angeles, where she managed Trust must be attributed as the original author and the title of the document specifi ed in the attribution. The views and opinions Ralph Lainson from his native England to Brazil. The Wellcome including – for the strong of stomach digital policy and audience strategy. expressed by writers within Wellcome News do not necessarily Trust’s longest-serving grantholder – 47 years so far – he has forged perhaps – a dirt-themed Supper Salon She has also worked at the National refl ect those of the Wellcome Trust or Editor. No responsibility a formidable reputation as a parasitologist, specialising in the on 13 April. Gallery, Tate, the Roya l Collection is assumed by the publisher for any injury and/or damage to and the National Gallery of Art in persons or property as a matter of products liability, negligence or disfi guring disease leishmaniasis. He has discovered nearly 100 new Other happenings include ‘Tell it Washington, DC. otherwise, or from any use or operation of any methods, products, parasite species, as well as the sand-fl y vectors that carry the disease. to Your Doctor’, two events that explore instructions or ideas contained in the material herein. ISSN 1356- An interest in insects also unites the researchers working as part the conversations between doctors and 9112. First published by the Wellcome Trust, 2011. Wellcome News is © the Wellcome Trust and is licensed under Creative Commons of the £10 million Insect Pollinators Initiative. Through this, nine patients, which will run on 16 and 21 New-look SPIN Attribution 2.0 UK. The Wellcome Trust is a charity registered in diverse groups are examining the pressing issue of how populations April. The ‘Born Today’ series, which England and Wales, no. 210183. Its sole trustee is The Wellcome of bees and other pollinators are collapsing and what can be done to looks at the moment of childbirth, We have relaunched our SPIN Trust Limited, a company registered in England and Wales, no. (Science Policy in the News) service reverse this trend. From neurobiologists to beekeepers, mathematical ce is at 215 Euston Road, London with a new look. A weekly email NW1 2BE, UK). modellers to nutritionists, this is a great example of people with PU-5047/12.8K/03-2011/MD,MC produced by our Strategic Planning diff erent interests coming together for a common, important cause. and Policy Unit, SPIN provides This document was printed on material 50% made from 25 per cent post-consumer Experiments with bees also feature heavily in the work of Beau waste & 25 per cent pre-consumer waste. concise digests of news stories Lotto, a neuroscientist and enthusiastic advocate for involving the Big Picture: relating to science policy. The new public in the process of discovery. He recently worked with primary- format includes direct web links to school children to help them become the fi rst in the world to plan, The Cell out now the original stories, where available. perform and publish their own scientifi c study in a peer-reviewed From the ethics of stem cell research to There’s a new dedicated website journal. Now, with Wellcome Trust support, he has taken his sculptures made of frozen blood, Big Picture: for the service at spin.wellco me. laboratory to the Science Museum, where people can take part The Cell, the latest issue of the free Wellcome ac.uk. Here, you can browse the in experiments. Trust educational resource for 16+ students, complete archive of SPIN, which dates back to 1992, or sign up These stories illustrate just a small proportion of the motivated explores all aspects of animal cells. Go to to receive the weekly emails. Cover: False-coloured and passionate people with whom we work, and we look forward to www.wellcome.ac.uk/bigpicture/cell to scanning electron You can also subscribe by micrograph of a bringing you the stories of many more in future issues. download a PDF of the magazine, order a honeybee (winner of a emailing [email protected].
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