Imperial Graduate School Blog

by Sarah Hayes, PhD student in the School of Public Health

How can we maintain mans’ best friendship? 

Here in the UK we think of dogs as mans’ best friend. But in some regions of the world they can be our deadliest enemy.

Meet Amos (name changed to protect identity).

He’s a 5-year-old boy living in rural Tanzania.

Ten days ago, he was bitten by a rabid dog.

Anyone exposed to rabies through a bite, scratch or lick from an infected animal must receive treatment immediately. A course of 3 vaccinations (known as post-exposure prophylaxis or ‘PEP’) will effectively protect a person from this deadly virus. But they must be given as soon as possible, ideally within 24 hours of the bite. Once signs of disease develop there is no effective treatment and you’re condemned to a painful, distressing death.

Amos hasn’t had these vaccinations.

Why?

Because in rural Tanzania, access to healthcare can be extremely challenging. Sometimes it’s a lack of awareness of the risks that stops people seeking treatment. At other times it’s a lack of access to healthcare. In Amos’s case the nearest hospital able to provide PEP was over 2 hours away.

Transport costs alone can be prohibitive to some families. Add on the price of treatment and you begin to understand why an estimated 59,000 people a year(1) are still dying of this preventable disease.

So, how can we protect children like Amos?

Vaccination of domestic dogs plays a key part. Whilst any mammal can be infected with rabies, domestic dogs are responsible for up to 99% of human rabies cases (2). If we reduce the level of rabies in dogs, we reduce the level in humans.

However, the benefits of dog vaccination campaigns can be compromised if rabies is circulating in other animals. Our research shows that in southern Tanzania where Amos lives, almost 50% of recently reported animal rabies cases have been in jackals. These jackals may have been infected by rabid dogs, but rabies could also be passing from jackal to jackal. Understanding the role that different species play in rabies transmission is vital in implementing effective control strategies. If rabies is being maintained in wildlife, vaccination of domestic dogs alone may not be enough.

Using a combination of ongoing surveillance, statistical analysis and mathematical modelling, my research is investigating the role of different species in rabies transmission in southern Tanzania. These techniques allow us to untangle the part each species is playing in virus transmission and to consider both the short- and long-term effectiveness of different control strategies. This is vital if we are to stamp out rabies from these communities and keep it out.

Thankfully, Amos did ultimately receive his vaccinations. But not everybody will be so lucky. Which is why it’s so important that we tackle rabies at its source and prevent people from being exposed in the first place. And if we can achieve this then who knows, maybe one day people the world over will be able to think of dogs as their best friends.

References

1. Hampson K, Coudeville L, Lembo T, Sambo M, Kieffer A, Attlan M, et al. Estimating the Global Burden of Endemic Canine Rabies. PLoS Negl Trop Dis. 2015;9(4).
2. World Health Organization. WHO | Rabies. Who. 2017; Available from: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs099/en/

Read 4Cs Science Communication Writing Competition – 3rd Place in full

by Oluwalogbon Akinnola, PhD student in the Department of Bioengineering

The Other Hand Model

If the first thing you think of when you hear the phrase ‘hand model’ is David Duchovny in the 2001 film Zoolander, then congratulations on your excellent taste. Unfortunately, however, no one was willing to fund a PhD researching his performance. No, in the world of Biomechanics hand model means something different yet no less appealing.

Our hands are how we communicate and manipulate the world around us. Feeding ourselves, checking the bathwater, even holding the medium this text is printed on: we use our hands to keep us healthy, happy, and safe. Understandably, this multifunctional system is complex. One quarter of the bones in the body are in the hands. They controlled by an intricate network of muscles and nerves that provide the most tactile feedback in the body and let us do everything from handstands to card tricks.  It is this complexity that makes it difficult to find a solution when things go wrong. Hand injury accounts for almost a fifth of cases at A&Es across the country and the UK spends over £100million a year treating them. Osteoarthritis of the hand affects at least 1.56 million people in the UK and there is no known cure. Understanding exactly how the hand works is vital to finding appropriate solutions to these problems.

My research is concerned with creating an accurate representation of the human hand. Specifically, I’m using mathematical equations and experimental data to create a computer simulation that will replicate the behaviour of the hand in various conditions. This will allow us to investigate nonhealthy hands and gain insight into how to heal them. The model I have been working on is an inverse kinematic model. This means that it works out the forces inside the hand from the movements, or kinematics, of the hand. For example, what is the force on your wrist when you pick up a cup? Motion capture, the same technology Andy Serkis used to give us Gollum, is used to provide the motion input for the model and the results are verified using cadaveric testing and electromyography (EMG).

EMG is the detection of the electrical signal produced by your muscles when they move and gives an indication of how much effort the muscle is exerting. In cadaveric testing, we apply forces to the tendons in a hand and measure the kinematics. Imagine Thing from The Addam’s Family but with pulleys. I compare the signal patterns and applied forces to the model results to verify that the model. With all three in agreement, I can conclude that the model is representative of the hand. Thus, it can be used to simulate the effects of surgery and rehabilitation to find the best solutions to hand injuries and diseases. Solutions that could change millions of lives for the better. This hand model may not be wearing diamond ring but I think it pretty exquisite.

Read 4Cs Science Communication Writing Competition – 2nd Place in full

by Stephanie Martin, MRes student in the Department of Life Sciences

Dear Present

Dear Sister,

I recently had an experience which reminded me of the stories Grandma used to tell us. I was hiding in what I thought was an animal’s den after being chased by water-raiders through the desert. The den turned out to be a large chamber, full of nothing except hundreds and hundreds of binders and a sign which said ‘The Daintree Rainforest – Lest We Forget.’

Do you remember what Grandma used to tell us about the Daintree? That luscious mythical jungle that used to inhabit these lands in Australia that we never really believed ever existed. I have included in this letter an old photograph that I found in an album marked ‘2019’, everything she told us about is there; trees too tall to climb, six-foot tall birds of electric blue running through the undergrowth, flowers, butterflies, and frogs… they’re all there.

The binders were full of scientific research from ages past. One paper caught my attention, ‘An Investigation into the Physiology of Trees and Lianas under Experimental Drought Conditions – by Stephanie Martin.’ I read the paper, taking in the (extremely sophisticated) statistical analyses and reading the (detailed and worthy of a distinction) manuscript written by this long since departed Master’s student. ‘Access to the rainforest canopy was gained via a crane’ she writes, ‘measurements were taken from tree species under standard tropical rainforest conditions, as well as those included in the drought experiment.’ I am jealous of this person’s existence in a time when they had to simulate drought conditions when we have lived through it our whole lives!

She goes on to detail her research, which I think you will find interesting. An instrument called a porometer was used to measure stomatal conductance; the rate of carbon dioxide entering and water vapour exiting the leaves via pores called stomata. The drought experiment covered 0.4ha and was evidently constructed using a series of clear-panel plastic roofing structures.

I’ll skip over the Results and Discussion sections, which were written in August 2019, and share with you the passage that has affected me most;

‘The simulated drought conditions reflect a possible future where seasonal rainforests experience hotter and longer dry seasons as a result of climate change. This project is important as global temperatures are set to increase by at least 2 °C degrees by the year 2100 (Raftery et al., 2017). It is essential that we assess the impact this warming effect may have on carbon sinks such as tropical rainforests in order to formulate management plans and influence governments and corporations to take action to prevent dangerous warming scenarios.’

It’s difficult to comprehend the magnitude of failure our ancestors caused when they ignored scientists calling for action to prevent climate change, resulting in a world now where people kill one another for water, and where rainforests are nothing but ancient history.

Maybe one-day things will get better.

All my love,

Your sister.

Read 4Cs Science Communication Writing Competition – 1st Place in full