This was an exciting summer working at Biotein as we secured funding from the Invisible College Track of the 1517 Fund and a grant from Emergent Ventures to support initial development and testing of our bio-age test, Senasce. We've also partnered with another company to work on the test development and testing, and are super excited for what's to come!
Cancer Stem Cell Vaccine
Vaccine Proposal
I finished my rough draft of an overview of the cancer stem-cell targeted vaccine approach I want to pursue, and will be submitting to various researchers and research labs to obtain some feedback and partners to work on the project. Super excited for this!
Epigenetic Causal Modelling
After a month of passively researching ways to accurately assess causal relations between specific epigenetic modifications and different endpoints, I have begun drafting algorithms that may help assess these relations and identify the most valuable epigenetic therapeutic candidates.
Influenza Universal Epitope Prediction
Finished First Draft of Epitope Prediction Software
I managed to finish an initial draft of the genetic algorithm that generates the optimal epitope across several strains of the influenza virus. I have obtained some initial feedback on this, and will be diving deeper into both immunology and evolutionary computing to determine most crucial changes necessary for increased accuracy and efficacy.
Website Revamp
In June, I finished and released my revamped website with updated information and a different design/style. Check it out at akshajdarbar.com, and feel free to email me at aadidar12@gmail.com if you have any feedback!
In this article I explore the mind-bending paradoxes developed by Zeno of Elea, which questioned our understanding of some of the most basic phenomena in the world, like the nature of motion itself. Definitely a fun article to write!
In this article I discuss the science behind oncolytic virus therapy, which makes use of the cytotoxic capabilities and host specificity of viruses to turn them into tumor-killing biological machines.
As someone who recently became very passionate about immunology, and its far-reaching applications across all of medicine, this video, with its beautiful graphics and easy-to-understand explanations of complex concepts, is a definite recommendation to anyone looking to understand just a little bit about the immune system.
Since their discovery, viruses have always continued to baffle scientists, making us constantly question what we think we knew about life and its characteristics. Well, this video covers some extremely large viruses (called giroviruses) and some viruses that target other viruses (called virophages) that challenge our understanding of viruses and life even more.
That's it for my brief update for this summer. Can't wait to pop back into your inbox in September to share how I've grown and what I've been up to!
If you would like to talk to me directly, don't hesitate to reach out to me on LinkedIn, Twitter, or by email.
See you next month!
Akshaj Darbar
18 y/o on a quest to tackle neurological ageing and develop prophylactic vaccinations for cancer.
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