Melissa Raine

• BSc (Hons) Biomedical Sciences
• Ex vivo exploration of host-microbial interactions in gastrointestinal health and disease: Isolation and banking of microbial isolates from preterm infants

Necrotising enterocolitis is a potentially devastating disease of babies born prematurely (prior to 37 weeks gestation), that is associated with a high early requirement for major surgery and a high mortality, with longer term implications for physical health in those that survive. The cause of the disease is not completely understood but is likely mediated by an inappropriate host immune response to intestinal microbes. We have established methodology for growing primary epithelial cells from resected tissue in babies with NEC (“preterm intestinal enteroids”) and now wish to explore the impact of co-culturing an array of microbial species with enteroids to examine host-microbial interactions. This project will isolate several microbial species from stool samples obtained from preterm babies for down stream ex vivo immune experiments.

Funding source: Newcastle University

Supervisors: Dr Christopher Lamb and Dr Christopher Stewart