Project details

Red blood cells develop through a process of maturation from erythroblasts to mature enucleated red cells. Our lab has developed and harnessed a number of models to study red cell production and function, using the range of cutting-edge techniques available at WEHI. These tools include HUDEP-2 and BEL-A cells, and erythroid cells differentiated from stem cells.  

Students will be able to apply a range of approaches including CRISPR-Cas9, advanced imaging, proteomics and functional genomics to study healthy and disordered red blood cell production and function. 

About our research group

We are a multidisciplinary laboratory comprising experts in skills, spanning experimental biology, epidemiology and biostatistics, and clinical medicine (e.g. Bennett BioRxiv 2022). Our lab seeks to discover new therapies to prevent and treat anaemia by making fundamental discoveries into how the body regulates its iron stores. We also undertake field studies in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia (e.g. Pasricha et al New Engl J Med 2021) to test new solutions and influence policy to address anaemia in babies and pregnant mothers.

We apply a range of cutting-edge techniques to samples from these field trials – for example, RNA-Seq (Hayman et al Nutrients 2021), microbiome analyses and immunologic approaches such as CyTOF, flow cytometry and related techniques.