18-year-old Singaporean student to present adult stem cell research paper at two conferences

18-year old Nicholas Tan Xue-Wei will soon depart for the U.S. to present a research paper at The 2007 World Congress in Computer Science, Computer Engineering, and Applied Computing (WORLDCOMP'07), June 25 to 28, in Las Vegas.

Before returning home to Singapore, Nicholas will continue to represent Singapore's Bioinformatics Institute by presenting his research paper at the World Congress on Engineering 2007 (WCE 2007), July 2 to 4 in London.

Nicholas will speak about his research paper, titled “Towards A Serum-Free Medium: Growth Receptors And Signaling Pathways That Regulate Multipotency In Human Mesenchymal Stem Cells."

He will describe the results of a preliminary screening of human growth factors and molecular pathways that would allow a type of stem cell commonly isolated from bone marrow to be grown in the laboratory under conditions that are safe for clinical trials. When grown under safer conditions, these cells (Mesenchymal Stem Cells) will have many therapeutic implications.

“Being nominated for the Best Paper Award at the World Congress on Engineering 2007, in competition with established researchers and Ph.D. students, is a rare and commendable achievement for an 18-year-old and a good testimonial of the work Nicholas carried out at BII,” said his mentor, Dr. Vivek Tanavde, a research scientist at BII.

Nicholas came to BII last October during a one-month research attachment.

Source: Agency for Science, Technology and Research