Ella’s summer lab work leads to world-class research Natural Sciences undergraduate Ella de Csilléry was a first year at St John’s when she became involved in research with the potential to transform the treatment of cancer and other diseases – and even reveal the origins of life on Earth. She tells Karen Clare what it was like.
Credit: Nordin Ćatić.
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lla was studying Physics, Chemistry, Biology of cells and Maths in 2019 when she decided to try to get some summer experience in a lab before her second year, and sent speculative emails to several St John’s Fellows. Professor Tuomas Knowles was the first to reply and offer a placement. His lab is a multi-disciplinary group doing pioneering research into disorders such as Alzheimer’s to develop new techniques for early diagnosis and treatment, so it was a thrilling prospect. “I was introduced to two researchers from the Knowles Lab, who later supervised me, and was sent some reading material over that year,” said Ella, from London. “Then, in the summer, I turned up at the lab with not too much idea of how it would pan out, I was just really eager to get involved in as many things as possible.” In fact, the now 20-year-old was to be involved in a research project that spanned the globe. During a phase separation experiment – in which two phases (in this case liquids rather than solids or gases) are created from a single homogeneous mixture – she witnessed a surprising chemical reaction. “One of my supervisors was explaining to me how phase separation works, and gave me a quick demonstration. He put two liquids together in a combination
where you might expect them not to phase-separate – but when we looked, the liquid was cloudy. He said, ‘hang on, that’s not what we expect to happen’. Under the microscope we could see the liquid had phase-separated, and that discovery kicked off further investigation, because we discovered that this happened not only in a low salt regime, as predicted, but also in a high salt regime,” said Ella. “It was very exciting.”
and working on other projects. It is quite unusual for an undergraduate to be involved in such ground-breaking research, not to mention a first year. “I don’t think it happens very often but my experience shows that if you want it to, then it can – it’s just about putting yourself out there and asking for the opportunity,” said Ella. “I appreciate I was really lucky but I wouldn’t have got that chance if I hadn’t asked. First years may not realise they have those opportunities The research showed for the first time that available to them at Cambridge. liquid-like protein compartments, known as condensates, in cells can re-enter a “I really enjoyed the amount of phase-separation regime in response to collaboration. It was great to have the different salt concentrations. Cells contain opportunity to work in Professor Knowles’s proteins and other biomolecules that lab and to have my work published. must be carefully organised for them to Everyone was so enthusiastic and function properly. Condensates remain supportive, it was an amazing experience.” segregated through the physics of phase separation, like oil and water. In a changed Professor Knowles said: “It was a great salt environment, the cell can trigger pleasure to host Ella in our lab. We the formation or dissolution of these are always keen to host exceptionally protein-rich liquids. Sometimes, these talented summer students for short components can go wrong, which can research projects, and Ella’s work was be implicated in diseases such as cancer truly impressive. She managed to obtain and Alzheimer’s. The findings may help remarkable new results in her project scientists develop future patient therapies focusing on understanding the – and could even tell us how life began molecular mechanisms of and evolved in Earth’s salty oceans. biomolecular condensate formation, and these formed an integral part Ella was listed among the contributing of a Nature Communications paper that authors of a research paper published in Ella contributed to, based on this work.” Nature Communications in February, beside her supervisors Dr Georg Krainer Last year Ella applied for summer lab work and Timothy Welsh, two of the lead at universities in the US and received co-authors. Cambridge’s Collepardo Lab, two offers, although sadly the pandemic which uses computational physics to meant she was unable to go. She plans research chromatin – the substance within to study a fourth year at St John’s to get a chromosome consisting of DNA and her Natural Sciences part III, and is now protein – was also involved in the research, considering graduate medicine. A singer along with scientists from the Technical in St John’s Voices, Ella also plays the University in Dresden, the Max Planck violin and College lacrosse when she Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and isn’t playing her part in potentially Genetics, and the University of Toronto. life-saving research. Ella spent eight weeks in the lab, helping to pull together supporting evidence 14
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