La Trobe Life

Hailing from the Bendigo Campus, Hannah Arnold, is using her skills she developed from her Bachelor of Business (Event Management/Marketing) at La Trobe in the Graduate Development Program. Hannah reflects on some of her best memories as a student at La Trobe.

"I had a fantastic learning experience at La Trobe, with academics who ensured we were all supported, learned what we needed, and gained practical experience. It was fantastic to have a close and ongoing relationship with my course coordinator, Paul Willard, over the three years of my course. Paul is a fantastic teacher and ensured we were all learning, while also challenging us and allowing us to grow.

Hear from Maddie Riddle discussing her time in the graduate program and her experience as a student moving from a regional town to the "big smoke". "I studied a Bachelor of Strategic Communication at the Bundoora campus and I am currently undertaking the Graduate Program at one of La Trobe’s fantastic regional campuses – Albury Wodonga. My first rotation was with The Murray-Darling Freshwater Research Centre which was a great experience. I was able to work with the researchers and staff to produce some great communication outputs such as a newsletter, social media content and promotional videos for one of the large projects within the Centre. I am currently working with the Tertiary Enabling Program (TEP) which is La Trobe’s pathway program into University. We work with students who didn’t finish school for various reasons or didn’t get the scores they wanted in year 12 or don’t have an English speaking background.

Postdoctoral researcher, Dr Amy Baxter, talks about what it is like to balance a career in science with having a family. 

Nicholas Anthony's PhD focuses on the development of a new type of microscope that uses laser light to image the way that cells and materials respond to external forces, or stresses.

Dr Ivan Poon, La Trobe Institute for Molecular Science, discusses his research into understanding the role of dying cells in our immune response to influenza A.

“In humans, billions of cells will die daily as part of normal turnover in various organs. It is vital that dying cells are rapidly removed as their accumulation has been linked to inflammation, autoimmunity, cancer and infection. To aid efficient removal of dead cells, dying cells often disassemble into smaller fragments for neighboring cells to engulf. Furthermore, certain cellular components can be packaged selectively into these fragments to regulate tissue repair and immunity.

Claretta D’Souza, a PhD candidate at La Trobe Institute for Molecular Science, discusses her research on Multiple Sclerosis, a debilitating neurological condition that affects millions worldwide.

“Multiple Sclerosis(MS) is a debilitating neurological condition that affects millions worldwide. There is no cure for the disease and the treatment options available are limited and only effective within a certain phases of the disease.

Luke Duncan is a PhD candidate at La Trobe Institute for Molecular Science, his research focuses on the rise of antibiotic resistant bacteria.

“For decades we have been using antibiotics however recently there have been cases of bacterial infections that are completely resistant to the antibiotics which used to be effective against them. This is a result of over exposure to antibiotics. Antibiotics put stress on the bacteria and they eventually mutate and evolve to develop ways to counter the antibiotics. The more bacteria are exposed to antibiotics the faster they develop resistance. There are now cases of some strains of bacteria, often referred to as “superbugs” that are resistant to all antibiotics. This includes bacteria that cause gonorrhoea, urinary tract infections and many hospital acquired infections. If this continues to happen we are heading for a future that looks a lot like the pre-antibiotic era where the doctor won’t be able to help with your chest infection and the risk of surgery and child birth will drastically increase.

“I work as a Director of the La Trobe University Psychology Clinic. We are a student-led clinic that offers psychological assessments and therapy to the general community. My job is to manage the Clinic, working as part of a team of supervisors training provisional psychologists. Every day is different: spending time supervising team-members, discussing cases, training skills, reading reports, and running therapy groups. It is a very enjoyable role, developing future clinical psychologists and neuropsychologists.    

I’ve been working at La Trobe for 2 years now. Prior to this I worked in London for 12 years, as a consultant clinical psychologist for an early intervention for psychosis service. My role was to manage a team of psychologists, who helped young people to recover from episodes of paranoia and hearing voices, by offering psychological therapies, such as cognitive behaviour therapy and family interventions. We worked in a part of London that was very diverse culturally and socio-economically, so it required a good deal of flexibility and skill as a psychologist to offer people help that would fit their needs.

While working in London I completed a PhD at King’s College, investigating the role that psychological flexibility plays when people hear distressing auditory hallucinations. Psychological flexibility refers to a set of skills in being present in the here and now, being open and non-judgemental about your internal experiences, so that you can flexibly do the things that matter to you. Psychological flexibility has reliably been found to be a key determinant in a range of wellbeing and quality of life outcomes, and associated with empathy, compassion, perspective-taking, and personal resilience.

What’s interesting about psychological flexibility is that it can be strengthened through practices like mindfulness, present-moment awareness, and connection with personal values. Strengthening these skills is a central focus of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), the psychological model that I research. With my colleagues at King’s College and City University London, we were able demonstrate that teaching people psychological flexibility skills in groups, improves their wellbeing and quality of life. These effects were demonstrated whether the groups consisted of people recovering from psychosis, family members of people with mental health issues, or with public sector health workers.

“My undergraduate degree was in Conservation Biology and Ecology. Honestly, for someone who never particularly enjoyed high school, the hands on experience and knowledge I gained from that degree was amazing. Still, I got right to the end and realised that I didn’t have the passion to make  conservation my career. I spent most of my final year lamenting what felt like a wasted opportunity, and wondering what I was going to do next.

In that final year of study, I took a physiology subject with Dr Robyn Murphy. I was instantly hooked—her skeletal muscle physiology lectures were incredible. From there I completed my Honours degree, before starting my PhD in Dr Murphy’s lab.

My PhD focusses on Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy (DMD). DMD is a debilitating neuromuscular disorder that affects approximately one in 3600 boys, causing progressive muscle deterioration and subsequent weakness with age. Those afflicted are often wheelchair bound by their teenage years and experience fatal respiratory and cardiovascular complications thereafter.

During the course of my research, I’ve found that the administration of the amino acid taurine helps to ameliorate some dystrophic symptoms. These include increasing muscle strength as well as improving the visible health of the muscle. The gold standard outcome for a DMD treatment is to increase strength and reduce muscle degeneration. Taurine is free of side effects and is currently used as a dietary supplement, so these findings show considerable promise.

"La Trobe is a big part of my life and I’m honestly so glad that I decided to study here. I studied a Bachelor of Computer Science, then after a brief interlude decided to come back and complete my Honours, writing a thesis on the convoluted topic of protection against advanced malware. By the time I was done I didn’t want to leave, so I and applied for the La Trobe graduate program. Along with 9 others, my application succeeded. I have been working here in the ICT department since December. Everyone is friendly and I really enjoy the work I do, which thus far has mostly been working alongside the web and mobile development team. I will also be doing other rotations throughout the year in different sections of ICT, potentially in the Unix team or at the Service Desk. Although I really like the people in my current team I’m also excited for challenges that lie ahead.