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Asked by to Heather, Ditte, Dave, Ben on 26 Jun 2014. This question was also asked by .
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Ditte Hedegaard answered on 25 Jun 2014:
Hi hanin10,
My research involves looked at the genetic codes of the hepatitis C virus in different parts of the liver and so far I’ve found that the virus infects the whole liver, and not just parts of it, and that the virus in one part of the liver have the same genes as in another part of the liver. Knowing how the virus is distributed in the liver will be important in developing new and better aimed treatments that can target the virus across the liver. Also, knowing which genes the virus have will help us figure out how good it is to avoid the immune system and potential treatments.
I don’t know if my research help the world, but I do feel that it will help the 170 million individuals who are infected with hepatitis C virus. There is currently no vaccination or treatment against the hepatitis C virus and it is important that we completely understand how the virus is transmitted, how it get into cells and how it spread in the liver before scientists can start developing new and better treatments.
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Heather Ritchie answered on 25 Jun 2014:
Absolutely. Everybody who is doing research and helping to further understanding is helping the world.
Some difficulties I face in my research is that many people have an idea that only medical research is worthwhile. Of course without people working on medical research we wouldn’t have the amazing ability to prevent and treat diseases etc.
Science which aims to solve a problem is called applied science and science which aims to further our understanding purely on the fact we don’t already know it is often called “blue skies science”. I am a blue skies scientist and fiercely proud of it too.
The work I do is looking at the deep sea which had never ever been explored before and how can we protect an environment that we don’t know about? People are often quick to disregard the environment and natural science mainly because it isn’t curing humans or producing money. I think it does so much more than that!
So I certainly do hope the work I do will help to protect the environment in the future!
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Dave Baker answered on 26 Jun 2014:
Yes. We work on crop improvement. Looking at drought resistant genes for instance to reduce loss of food in times of drought. We look at other crops like rape seed and try and increase the oil amount per plant. With the world population expanding this is important. We have a massive group here working with streptomyces looking into developing new antibiotics which would save lives from infectious evolving bacteria… So it’s endless what we do for world health and sustainability.
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Ben White answered on 26 Jun 2014:
Hi @hanin10, good question!
We’re definitely trying to help the world.
Currently we’re trying to understand how wheat gets infected by new diseases better, to help farmers protect their crops and improve the yeild of food from the crop.
We’re also working with lots of scientists around the world to stop the spread of Ashdieback, as this is killing out Ash trees; these are very important for the wood we use to build things and also are the habitats for much of our wildlife. Our work has made it into the national news also: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22913111
Another project we’re working on is to try and save our honey bees, as you may have heard our bees are currently dying and we don’t know why. We need these bees not just for their honey, but also to pollinate our crops and flowers. Without bees we would find it hard to grow food!
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