Rosie Hutton

• MChem Chemistry with Study Abroad
• The Design and Synthesis of Triple Function Probes of Mitochondrial Disease

The LJH research group has developed new fluorescent compounds which are highly selective for imaging mitochondria, on account of their positive charge, which attracts them across the organelle’s negatively charged membrane. Importantly, if the charge on the membrane is altered, due to mitochondrial damage, the probes ability to cross the membrane is perturbed and this can be evaluated by flow cytometry - thus the accumulation of the probes in the mitochondria could be used to assess whether there is evidence of dysfunction or not. As mitochondrial damage has been implicated in a wide variety of diseases, including Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease, the potential to detect problems early on without invasive surgery is very attractive. Over the 8 weeks I worked with many bodipy complexes including phosphonium salts, gained lab experience and improved upon basic lab techniques.

Funded by: Newcastle University

Project Supervisor: Dr Lee Higham