Navessa Padma Tania received NRS Travel Grant

Experimental Biology 2016, San Diego, CA, USA.

I am a PhD student at the Department of Molecular Pharmacology, University of Groningen. My research aims to understand the role of Follistatin-like 1 in lung development and disease, particularly in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The NRS travel grant allowed me to participate in the Experimental Biology international conference which was held in San Diego, CA, USA. This annual conference brings together international experts from 6 large biological societies, including the American Physiological Society, American Society for Investigative Pathology, and American Society for Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics. Therefore, it offers the latest data and current understanding of disease progression and therapeutic interventions, ranging from basic science to clinical studies. Speakers focused on lung development, pulmonary vascular diseases, and mucociliary epithelial cell differentiation, were of particularly interest for me. Several talks covered various signaling cascades, including BMP signaling, in different organs, ranging from brain, kidney, and intestine. I was invited to give a talk at the angiogenesis in organ development and function session, demonstrating that the endothelial specific deletion of Follistatin-like 1 is postnatally lethal and results in deregulation of BMP-mediated protein expression and may contribute to microvasculature remodeling. Attending the Experimental Biology conference provided me a platform for critical discussion with the experts in the field, besides merely presenting our findings to a broad audience. Moreover, it was a great opportunity to build scientific networks and start up collaboration with other researchers. Furthermore, the career development workshop which targeted for young investigators during the conference allowed me to interact directly with scientific consultants and people from pharmaceutical industry, start-up companies, and diagnostic labs, which broadened my view for career options after my PhD.

To conclude, the Experimental biology conference has widened and broadened my knowledge on lung and vascular development which definitely fruitful for me to develop new ideas to follow up my study. I thank the NRS for the opportunity to share and discuss my research with the experts from all over the world.

Navessa Padma Tania
Department of Molecular Pharmacology
University of Groningen