This is the MSc in immunology and infectious diseases.
So what we do is we study how the body defends itself against infection
and how we can use that information to make vaccines to prevent
infectious diseases. Immunology is a difficult and complex subject, so you're
going to learn a lot about the basic concepts of how it works,
but the skills you'll gain are very generic because we talk about how to
make you into a biomedical scientist.
So I chose to study the immunology of infectious diseases because
while I was in Uganda particularly HIV,
I was there working for the MRC
in Uganda on an HIV cohort and
you just saw the devastation that HIV had on these people's lives. One thing I really like
about the course was
that you can study not only the immunology of the diseases,
but at the same time you got to see the bigger picture of what you're studying so
there are other courses like epidemiology and public health and you get to
see your disease which is studying in bigger picture
Most immunology courses are not devoted to infectious diseases because they
study cancer or auto-immunity or other
human problems, but we're embedded in a school a public health
so the wonderful thing about this course is that we focus on infectious diseases
and we're embedded within an institute that studies the problems of poverty
and public health issues in a broader context. So it's a great place to combine
the infection the immunology and the context of human disease.
In the practicals, depending on what modules you took, you could focus
on the more diagnostics side for example.
One of my modules was a clinical module for example.
You could work on specimens they brought in from - I think St George's Hospital -
so actual patients with suspected measles or different diseases
and you could actually do the tests as it would be done in a hospital.
It was really interesting.
The course really gave me the lab-based skills that I needed
And at the same time gave me the skills to be able to approach a question
from lots of different angles, so that's where the other courses come in, so you can
look at the bigger picture, and see the epidemiology and everything else.
Immunology research is mostly wet lab research, we get our hands dirty by
working at the bench
doing biological experiments. There is more by informatics now so there is more
computing involvement but basically you're going to be working in the
laboratory.
The advantage is that you can work with us here at Keppel Street, at the London
School,
in one of the main research labs that might work on tuberculosis or malaria.
But we also have funding opportunities to take you to the Gambia
or to Tanzania or to Thailand to actually work with our collaborators there.
One of the great things about the teaching for my course specifically, was that
you had such small classes. So there was about 20 of us in the class, allowing
one-to-one with all the lecturers and external speakers who came in.
I found the support during the actual project, during the
dissertation write-up, really good.
There was basically one post-doc who was set to help
me throughout the dissertation and it was one-to-one with that person the whole time.
Then we had lab meetings every week
but the primary supervisor's support was great.
I thought the teaching was excellent
especially me I came from a background
that wasn't very strong in immunology of infectious disease
and from the beginning I never really felt
out of place compared to other students who maybe had a bit more background.
Everything's so well explained, by the end of each week, I was like "wow I know this
this week, and I didn't know that last week".
They're quite friendly so we are lucky to have very
friendly staff you can always email to ask questions or get
extra handouts, extra information.
The course starts off where everybody's together doing a core set of immunological programmes
and that's important because then everybody gets the same information
and brings you up to understanding the basic concepts.
But then you get a chance to choose different modules within the course and
so now you can pick and match which modules you want to do
and everybody will do a slightly different group of modules
based on what they want to do after the course.
And then you can choose your project
because we have a large number of projects on offer,
some of them in the building,
some of them overseas, and if you're interested in malaria, then
we try to match you up with a malaria project
or if you're interested in TB, we guide you down that road.
The other nice thing is that my job doesn't finish when the year ends.
I mean my job is to help you move on from this course
so I'm constantly giving you references, helping you make decisions about what
PhD programs or other places might be useful,
and I enjoy being emailed and called up after you've left the course and say
"Look Greg, I'm interested in going to this
particular place, what do you think?".
So we're very happy to keep in contact with you
after the course is finished.
I would recommend a course to anyone who
thinks they want to go into an infectious diseases direction but isn't quite sure
exactly which disease they want to be studying, and it's because
it gives you a good all-round
you see epidemiology, you see public health at the same time,
so you can branch out into those different disciplines.
I definitely recommend the course to anyone
or any of the courses. I spoke to a lot people
on the wide range of courses and everyone seemed happy and
it's just that the standard of the teaching, as well as the environment,
for me was amazing.
A happy year, definitely.