Life Sciences at Brunel

Elie popped in to see us today! He got his Life Sciences BSc degree in the summer but couldn’t come to graduation because of COVID. Great to see him and he’ll have an amazing future ahead of him. He studied Genetics and Computational Data Analytics, which is what I wish I’d studied at University!

We had a great Brunel bake-off competition yesterday in the marquee in front of the Heinz Wolff Building and raised £230 for Breast Cancer Now! The winner was second year Yashvi Panchal who baked 5 different flavours of mini cupcakes and muffins! Here she is with Dr Mann, who organised the event!

We’ll have another event next month for Movember to raise awareness for prostate cancer and mental health!

Great open day today welcome future students on with excellent student ambassadors and !

Last week the students returning to their final year from their Sandwich Year/Year in Industry presented a poster to the current second years to tell them about all the great stuff they learn and do in their year out from study in the “real world”. They do this in a “Networking Event” where they learn how to mingle and, network, with other professionals/job seekers. tried to cheat by having a picture of him with an adorable dog, which he claimed had some relevance to his work with Regeneron, a Biotech company with offices in Uxbridge! Riham, who spent a year working as a data scientist for GSK, was much more professional!
We’re super-proud of what our students achieve on placement and students who do that have better degree outcomes. Our Professional Development Centre (PDC) have careers consultants and advisors who help our students get placements by running CV and cover letter workshops, mock interviews and more. The second year students do these kinds of activities in the “Career Skills” module but graduated students can also get help from the PDC for 3 years after graduation.

Answer This Question: What can you see cunningly hidden in this picture?

a) The marketing manager from 2022.
b) Christmas wrapping paper from 2018.
c) A Scalextric set from 2011.
d) A music collection from 2006.
e) The keyboard player of a Blondie cover band from 2014.

A rainbow over the semi-tropical Heinz Wolff Building.

Graduation is a serious, solemn occasion.

We had a great open day on Wednesday with loads of future students! Our academics come from all over the world to do their teaching and research . Here’s Dr Ronan McCarthy, he’s Irish. He’s a microbiologist who works on antimicrobial resistance in nasty bugs like Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Acinetobacter baumannii. The students doing the Infection and Immunity options will learn about his research in Medical Microbiology in their second year!
# Microbiology

We had a great open day today with loads of future students! Our academics come from all over the world to do their teaching and research . Here’s Dr Kazu Tomita, he’s from Japan. He’s a human cancer geneticist who works on telomere biology and chromosome maintenance. The students doing the Cell Biology options will learn about this kind of thing in the Biology and Treatment of Cancer in their third year!

The first group of Life Sciences BSc graduated last year. Here’s what Auri says about her experience studying the Life Sciences BSc!

“The Life Sciences BSc taught me to combine different branches of study to achieve the most efficient solutions. Modern science is constantly evolving and the only way to improve it is to think about the bigger picture!
Having Infection and Immunity as my major stream, Environmental Health as my minor, and anthropology as my elective, provided me with a wider perspective to approach epidemiological studies. This pandemic made us realize it’s impossible to address a public health issue without considering the bigger impact. Epidemiological studies aren’t complete without assessment of the influences of the environment over a population, nor without the study of the socio-economic background of the affected communities. I had the opportunity to learn about infection and immunity from contrasting perspectives, allowing me to consider all the angles to a problem. The Life Sciences degree is not only educating scientists but socially aware individuals ready to tackle real-life issues.
I put these skills into practice during my internship at the Department of Genetics of the University of Cambridge, in a project that merged Epigenetics and Bioinformatics and collaborating with this research group provided the opportunity to broaden my knowledge of genetics and improve my bioinformatics skills, but it has helped me build my confidence and autonomy as a researcher!
I’m now working as a research assistant at the Fetal Medicine Research. I plan to go into a Ph.D. in epigenetics. I am convinced that with the experience and knowledge I was able to access thanks to my degree at Brunel, I have been able to reach my full potential as a member of a modern and more humane science community.”

The first group of Life Sciences BSc graduated last year. Here’s what Jacob says about his experience studying with us!

“The Life Science BSc is a unique interdisciplinary science degree that has allowed me to explore uncharted territories. With the Life Science BSc, there is an enormous variety of opportunities available to you, as you’ll be able to mix different disciplines and implement ideas across academic areas. With the synoptic assessments the student is allowed to explore areas where the chosen streams overlap, which are often emerging research areas that really emphasize the student’s interests.

I studied Computational Data Analytics and Environmental Science as my chosen streams. These two streams might not seem like an obvious combination, but they have more in common than you’d think! With a bit of Computer Science knowledge, it’s possible to go into a large variety of jobs, particularly the continuously growing tech industry. Environmental Science is also in growing demand, with sustainability gaining traction because of Climate Change and rising inequalities. The amount of data gathered on sustainability platforms means that there is a huge need for graduates with computer science skills and sustainability knowledge.

Right now I am working as a Sustainability Data Analyst at a company called World Wide Generation. I was hired to complete specific projects related to causality, which was a large part of my Final Year Project at Brunel University. I love the topic - it is incredibly rewarding, and difficult at the same time. I would never have been able to work in such a high growth environment if it wasn’t for the Life Science BSc.”