Janet Kenyon and her team of microinjectionists have been designing the new transgenics course at Harwell which will take place 16–18th October, here she tells us a bit more about the course and her work at MRC Harwell.
I am Head of Gene Delivery The main goal of my role is to produce new mouse mutants for our clients and determine how best to achieve this and deliver on our targets. I have worked in mouse genetics for many years I have had the opportunity to work with mouse mutants for a number of years as a researcher, both during my D.Phil and on into my Post Doc, before moving to MRC Harwell to work first with the Mouse Archive and then more recently in my current position. The main reason I work in this field is due to its relevance to society and human disease I worked in plant biology immediately after graduating undergraduate studies which I enjoyed but with my work now I can really see the impact of what we are doing and I find this very motivating. If you are going to word hard you want to believe in what you are doing! I think that training is lacking generally across the higher field in science A lot of learning happens by trial and error. There haven’t been any courses relevant to my area since I joined, and very few tailored to practical teaching. We are aiming to fill this gap and provide hands on experience, tailored to newcomers Our course is three days long and is designed to build knowledge day by day. Day 1 – the first day starts out with demonstrations of four main teaching elements: Harvesting one cell embryos Sorting them to pick out the fertile ones Set-up and operation of a microinjection rig Embryo microinjection Day 2 – on the second day a greater emphasis is placed on applicants trying for themselves with one to one guidance from technicians to build confidence and help fast track their learning. Day 3 – the aim of the last day is to build independence with the new techniques and knowledge learnt from the previous days. The course is aimed at technicians or scientist who are new to the field or those looking to refresh their skills. Looking ahead If the course goes well we will look at the training available across the transgenics field and see what requirements there are. For example there may be demand for training covering more advanced techniques that may take the form of shorter two day courses. Outside of work I have a black belt in karate and enjoy running socially with colleagues at work. For more information about this course and to register your interest click here
