Anna Barratto Roldán takes part in her first secondment at GSI
Anna Baratto Roldán, OMA Fellow based at the CNA in Seville, visited GSI from the 4th of November to the 15th of December, for her first secondment. During this fruitful period, she joined the Biophysics group under the supervision of Dr. Michael Scholz, and learnt about basic radiobiology techniques, receiving a training on the methods for the preparation and irradiation of cell samples, the measurement of growth curves and cell survival curves and the subsequent analysis of samples.
The aim of this training period was to learn about the biology specific language and methods, and to understand in deeper detail the needs of a facility for radiobiology experiments, in view of a future collaboration with biologist groups in Seville for the irradiation of cell samples at the CNA cyclotron facility. Anna carried out her first radiobiology experiments irradiating CHO cell samples with X-rays. Another secondment is foreseen in the next months, during the GSI beam time, so that irradiations with carbon and other ions will also be possible.
Anna also took the opportunity to visit the UNILAC experimental cave for radiobiology experiments at the GSI, talking with different experts about the setup for the irradiation of cell samples, and discussing possible improvements of the setup currently installed at the CNA cyclotron facility. These conversations were very helpful and provoked many questions, giving rise to new ideas and solutions for future work.