DPAG DPhil student Joel Beevers has won second prize in “Picturing Parkinson's”, a national image competition organised by Parkinson’s UK. The competition was organised by support and research charity Parkinson’s UK in memory of Oxford graduate Dr Jonathan Stevens, a medical researcher who died from the disease in December 2013 at the age of 34.
Joel’s image, “Tangled Web” showed stem cells that are being cultivated in the Laboratory of Molecular Neurodegeneration and Gene Therapy and turned into brain cells.
Joel was also featured in the Oxford Times.
Images from other members of the lab Heather Booth, Hugo Fernandes and Federico Zambon, were also among the top 10 pictures entered. See the top 10 images here.
Tangled Web (runner-up) - Joel Beevers, University of Oxford
Skin cells from people can be reprogrammed to turn into stem cells, which can develop into almost any type of cell in your body. Here they’re grown into the type of brain cells that die in Parkinson’s.
Purple haze - Heather Booth, University of Oxford
In Parkinson’s the nerve cells that produce dopamine die off in an area of the brain called the midbrain. No one knows why. This image is of midbrain nerve cells created in the lab, which will help to uncover this mystery.
The Odyssey - Hugo Fernandes, University of Oxford
These cells are at the start of a remarkable journey from skin cells to nerve cells. They can tell us a huge amount about what’s going wrong in the brains of people with Parkinson’s. This technique could be the answer to replacing the nerve cells that are lost in the condition.
Galaxy - Federico Zambon, University of Oxford
Nerve cells which produce a chemical called dopamine have been created from the skin cells of people with Parkinson’s. The green staining confirms the cells they’ve made are nerve cells, and the enzyme responsible for producing dopamine in the cells can be seen in red.
Fireball - Hugo Fernandes, University of Oxford
What looks like an angry ball of fire is actually an image revealing the journey of adult skin cells being converted into neurons from Parkinson's patients in the lab. Once the nerve cells are created their potential as a tool in Parkinson’s research is huge.
More information: www.parkinsons.org.uk/news/12-november-2014/picturing-parkinsons-beauty-our-brains-revealed