Faeza Ebrahimi (pictured with Professor Robert Love, Dean and Head of School of Dentistry and Oral Health, Griffith University) has been awarded the prestigious Leonard Hansen Prize, an annual prestigious award administered by the Australian Dental Research Foundation.
The Griffith University student worked on a project that examined bone invasive properties of oral squamous cell carcinoma and its interactions with bone cells via stimulation of cell-adhesive molecules.
The prize is awarded to the recipient of the Trebitsch Research Grant, if they supplied their final report no later than 31 July in the year following the awarding of the grant's $2,200 endowment.
The Trebitsch Grant, which provides research support for a student in dentistry or an oral health university program who conducts a research project in microbiology, immunology, biochemistry, molecular biology with a relevance to clinical dentistry,
Faeza's project examined the properties of oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) which is a common cancer of the head and neck which can become aggressive if left untreated. This aggressiveness is due to its ability to invade locally and mestatasize to different sites in the body, a capability which makes identifying its invasive properties a vitally-urgent objective.
The project examined the growth, migration and protein markers in a co-culture model of OSCC in a bid to understand exactly how this invasive feature operates, an essential step in developing effective therapy for this aggressive tumour.
