A Springboard Fellowship: Investigating the T cell repertoire in malplacentation disorders and developing a novel classification system for assigning cause of death in twin pregnancies

Gulati, Nidhi ORCID: 0000-0002-4132-4998 (2022). A Springboard Fellowship: Investigating the T cell repertoire in malplacentation disorders and developing a novel classification system for assigning cause of death in twin pregnancies. University of Birmingham. M.Sc.

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Abstract

In the first project I examined the peripheral and decidual T cell populations in pre-eclampsia and fetal growth restriction by collecting samples of maternal blood and placenta from postpartum women whose pregnancies were affected by these placentally-mediated disorders, herein known as malplacentation disorders. After isolating white cells from these different samples, antibody staining was performed to enable comparison of the T cell repertoire in maternal blood and placental tissue in healthy pregnancies and those complicated by malplacentation. For the second project I worked with a multi-disciplinary panel of obstetricians and perinatal pathologists supervised by Professors Kilby (University of Birmingham) and Heazell (University of Manchester) to develop a novel classification system for assigning the cause of fetal and neonatal death in twin pregnancies using post-mortem reports. This new classification system was then tested using a retrospective cohort sample of 256twin pregnancies with single or double fetal death. I was able to determine inter-rater, intra-rater and inter-disciplinary agreement. Successful peer reviewed publication of this work in the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology(BJOG) establishes this project as an important piece of original work in the field of fetal and maternal medicine.The BJOG, an international journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, now has an impact factor of 5.19, and is ranked 6th out of 83 obstetrics and gynaecology journals in the Journal Citation Reports rankings.In both projects I have also explored the potential for further research and how I might take each project forward with more time and funding.

Type of Work:

Thesis (Masters by Research > M.Sc.)

Award Type:

Masters by Research > M.Sc.

Supervisor(s):