Excitement at IMC FH Krems
For the first time, graduates of IMC Krems were awarded this prize, thus the excitement at the FH Krems is very high.
"The bachelor degree programme in Betriebswirtschaft für das Gesundheitswesen provides a broad basis enabling students to understand the healthcare system and its stakeholders. From the pharmaceutical industry to insurance companies and medical technology companies, but also health facilities such as primary care units and hospitals," explains Manfred Pferzinger, programme director and Deputy Chair of the Academic Board.
"The orientation of our master degree programme in Medical and Pharmaceutical Biotechnology, which includes biotechnological aspects as well as strong medical components, enables our graduates to pursue a successful career in the national and international biotechnology industry on the one hand, and on the other hand to assert themselves in international PhD programmes without any problems," emphasises Harald Hundsberger, Head of the Department of Life Sciences.
"The outstanding achievements of our graduates contribute to the fact that our partners from industry and commerce perceive us as an excellent university with cutting-edge educational content and research topics," said IMC CEO Ulrike Prommer.
Excellent concept for knowledge transfer in schools
"The knowledge from my bachelor degree programme in Betriebswirtschaft für das Gesundheitswesen at IMC FH Krems was of particular importance for this project," explains Mariella Seel. The IMC graduate received an award for the project "KARLI - Augmented Reality Learning Interface for Children" together with a four-member working group of students from the master degree programme Digital Health Care at FH St. Pölten.
KARLI is an Augmented Reality Smartphone App, which offers pupils of Primarstufe II a tangible and comprehensible learning experience about the human body, in addition to traditional teaching and learning materials. Particularly innovative are the children-friendly design, the user-centered design process in the development phase and the character as an exemplary tool for imparting health knowledge. The main focus is on the public health background of the project.
Master thesis with focus on cancer research
Victoria Sarne received an award in the category of Master/Diploma Thesis. With her outstanding work entitled "Inducing site specific DNA methylation using the CRISPR/cas9 system", which was dedicated to the development and progression of cancer, Sarne was able to convince the top-class jury.
Modern life sciences have shown that the manifestation of genetic information is associated with many diseases. For example, the activity of a gene can be influenced by methylation of DNA. DNA methylation is one of the dominant mechanisms of epigenetic regulation. The CRISPR/cas9 system is a genetic engineering tool that has recently been extended to the epigenome. This application is shown in two genes that are essential for cell cycle regulation, one of which has already been published.
The data of the second gene were evaluated for the first time at IMC University of Applied Sciences Krems. The technology is well established and allows an exact description of the epigenetic processes and their consequences of the dysregulation of the cell cycle. In the future, this will help to answer many open questions, particularly in the development and progression of cancer. The work of the young graduate, who is currently working as a project assistant at Med University Vienna, was supervised by the IMC researcher and graduate Rita Seeböck.
Importance of science communication
Nowadays, science communication has become a necessity for universities and research institutions. The development of a knowledge society, changes in the media and an increasing orientation towards dialogue have increased the importance of science communication. The topic of science communication - the communication of research questions to a non-scientific audience - is of great concern to IMC Krems.
About the Wissen schaf[f]t Zukunft prize
The Wissen schaf[f]t Zukunft prize is awarded once a year by the NÖ Forschungs- und Bildungs-GmbH. It is designed to highlight the high quality scientific achievements of young people. Since 2016, the award has been dedicated to the fields of research defined in the FTI programme of the Province of Lower Austria. The aim is to increase motivation for further research in the respective scientific field.
