When Prajjwal Bomzon-Tamang and Apurva Thanju attend biochemistry lab at Gordon College, they work with state-of-the-art technology that could directly impact the health of the population of Nepal, their native country, and the rest of the developing world.
The two senior biology majors work under the tutelage of Craig Story, associate professor of biology at the Wenham Christian college.
Bomzon-Tamang and Thanju, along with eight other biology and chemistry students, catalog cells, conduct protein analysis and run western blots to analyze hepatitis B antibodies obtained by microengraving, a technology in the early stages of development.
"Microengraving will potentially provide a way to gather more detailed information about the immune response to new vaccine, using fewer subjects," Story, of Salem, said in a release provided by the college. "The end result could be better vaccines ¬— becoming available more quickly — than otherwise would be possible."
From his office on the third floor of the school's new Ken Olsen Science Center, Story explained that microengraving borrows technology from Renaissance-era intaglio printing, in which images were etched onto plates, covered with ink and then transferred to paper by way of a press.
Similarly, the microengraving process involves capturing cells into microscopic wells and transferring, or "printing," their secreted proteins onto a glass surface. An inverted, fluorescent microscope is then employed to locate individual cells of interest — from among thousands of other cells — which are then collected with a fine needle.
"(The technology) is so new that it's easy to continually make small improvements," Story said of microengraving, which he helped to develop in 2006, while on sabbatical at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research in Cambridge. At Whitehead, Story worked with Chris Love, who he said invented the technology with other researchers from Whitehead, which is associated with MIT.
"We can do that here much faster than it can be done anywhere," Story said of producing new antibodies with greater efficiency and speed. "No other labs in the world have this yet."
The goal, Story said, is to perfect the process and eventually have students develop hepatitis B antibodies on Gordon's campus. From there, he hopes to move onto to developing antibodies for other diseases, such as malaria, HIV and hepatitis C.
This is good news for Alynne MacLean of the nonprofit Science with a Mission, which makes and distributes test kits for these diseases and others affecting the developing world, such as chlamydia, gonorrhea, syphilis, and h. pylori, the main culprit behind ulcers.
Currently, MacLean must purchase antibodies to test for these diseases; if Gordon supplied them, she could pass the savings onto global health outreach organizations, medical missions and church groups who travel to these countries.
Currently, Science with a Mission charges groups from the United States and Canada $2 for chlamydia and gonorrhea test kits, and $1 for all others. It provides the diagnostic kits to affected countries at no cost, she said, but shipping is very expensive.
"I want to get these tests wherever they're needed around the world, and right now the biggest hindrance is not having sufficient money to get as many tests out as what is needed," said MacLean, adding that her organization only send kits to places where they have the medicine to treat the disease.
According to MacLean, the money saved could be used to produce more kits to send to even more locations.
"The biggest thing for me is the thousands of people in the developing world that don't have U.S. medical mission teams coming to them," said MacLean, a Gordon alumna who was a visiting scholar at Salem State College for several years.
"When I was a student, I would have loved the opportunity to have been a small part of a research project that would be able to help people in the developing world," said MacLean. "Science is fun for me no matter what, but there is a much greater sense of satisfaction when you can use your science to do some good in the world."
In Story's biochemistry lab, students Bomzon-Tamang and Thanju are making a difference for their homeland.
"This concept would be great for countries like Nepal," said Bomzon-Tamang, who plans to go to medical school for general surgery then return home to work in a mission hospital.
"We don't have enough surgeons in my country, so that would be a good field," he said.
