King Chow - Life Science and Medicine

45

38

41.5

Ariana Costas

Ms

17/08/2000

AY259

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+33773162799

44 Rue Oberkampf, Boite aux lettres 17
Paris
France

As a graduate student undertaking a collaborative, interdisciplinary and international project, I initiated and established as a partnership between institutes in Australia and France. Thus, developing a relationship that encourages a culture of knowledge exchange and innovation. I have first-hand experience of what benefits the exchange of ideas between labs with distinct expertise can bring, in terms of international relationships, to advance high-impact science and expand knowledge. This collaboration arose as a direct result of me attending a conference, challenging myself to network and reach out to my current supervisor to discuss projects and my goals as a future scientist. As a result, I moved into the field of immunology from microbiology, learning new skills and techniques and navigating a new lab environment while adjusting to living in a new country. One of my long-term goals is to become a research leader. Attending the Hong Kong Laureate Forum will be a valuable step toward this goal, with the chance to engage with and learn from distinguished scientists while connecting with other like-minded, enthusiastic individuals.

Postgraduate (PhD)

Immunology and Microbiology

University of Technology Sydney/ Australian Institute of Microbiology and Infection/ Institute Cochin

Sydney, Australia/Paris, France

AIMI Excellence in Research Training Scholarship, Dean's Merit list for academic excellence in 2020 and 2022

Urinary tract infections (UTI) are among the most common bacterial infections. With the high prevalence of infection and the global emergence of antibiotic-resistant uropathogens, UTI are challenging to treat. This is particularly evident when uropathogens evade antibiotics without resistance genes, known as antibiotic non-response. Several factors in the urinary tract may contribute to this phenomenon, including host immunity. In the context of a collaboration, we have used two different mouse strains for bladder infection models. Our preliminary investigations have revealed bacterial infection progresses differently between these two strains. Compared to C57BL/6 mice, where we have established infection kinetics, UTI in the CBA/J mice peaks one day later, at day 2 post-infection, and takes longer to resolve. To understand why this might be, we investigated the naïve immune cell compartment of the bladder and the kinetics of immune cell infiltration and bacterial uptake. Surprisingly, C57BL/6 have more resident macrophages in the naïve state, 24 and 48 hours post-infection, and C57BL/6 macrophages phagocytose more bacteria than those in CBA/J. Given the diverse clinical outcomes of UTI, understanding immune differences among mouse strains may allow us to better model this disease and test potential non-antibiotic-based therapies to treat multi-drug resistant and recurrent UTI.