Wellcome Image Award Winner
Scientific Visualisation
Digital Design & Production
Science Communication
BehMeh Media won a Wellcome Image Award in 2015 for 'Delivering Medicine to the Brain', a scanning electron micrograph produced in collaboration with Professor Khuloud T. Al-Jamal, Professor of Drug Delivery and Nanomedicine and Head of Medicines Development at King's College London.
Wellcome Image Awards
WINNING IMAGE
'Delivering medicine to the brain'
Scanning electron micrograph of a single brain cell (coloured green and pink). A rectangular cut has been made in the cell to watch how tiny, nanometre-sized (1 nanometre = 0.000001 mm) particles (coloured red and brown) interact with its surface. These tiny particles are called carbon nanotubes and are nano-sized cylinders made of carbon atoms. They are being researched for their ability to act as carriers to deliver drugs or genes to cells – for example, anticancer medicines to a tumour. This is particularly important in the brain because many medicines cannot easily cross the blood–brain barrier, a protective layer of cells that regulates entry of molecules to the brain.
Scanning electron micrograph. Diameter of the cell is approximately 20 micrometres (0.02 mm).
Credit line: Dr Khuloud T. Al-Jamal & Serene Tay / BehMeh Media
About the Wellcome Image Awards
The Wellcome Image Awards were the Wellcome Trust's principal recognition of excellence in health, medicine and science visualisation. They recognised the creators of the most informative, striking and technically excellent images communicating significant aspects of health, medicine and science, selected by a panel of judges drawn from science communication, medicine and biomedical research. Awarded annually from 1997, the Awards were restructured in 2018 as the Wellcome Photography Prize. Winning images were exhibited internationally across the UK, Europe and the USA, in science centres, museums, galleries and festivals.
About the collaboration
'Delivering Medicine to the Brain' was produced with Professor Khuloud T. Al-Jamal at King's College London, and forms part of a wider series of scientific research images created with collaborators including Belén Ballesteros, Houmam Kafa and Noelia Rubio.
The award-winning image was produced as part of a series documenting nanomedicine research at King's College London, spanning drug delivery across the blood-brain barrier, nanomaterial toxicity testing models and graphene research.
SERIES IMAGES
in collaboration with PROFESSOR Khuloud T. Al-Jamal
'BRAIN ASTROCYTE CELL TAKING UP CARBON NANO-NEEDLES'
This is a scanning electron micrograph of an astrocyte cell (coloured in brown) captured in the process of taking up carbon nanotubes (green colour). Carbon nanotubes are allotropes of carbon with a cylindrical nanostructure which have been recently explored as drug delivery systems due to their “nano-needle” characteristics.
Scanning electron micrograph.
Diameter of the cell is approximately 20 micrometers.
Credit line: Dr Khuloud T. Al-Jamal & Serene Tay
'Nano-needles shuttling the blood brain barrier'
Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are tubular nanostructures made of rolled-up graphene layers. CNTs have been proposed as drug and gene nanocarriers. The blood brain barrier is a protective layer of cells that regulates entry of molecules to the brain. Despite acting as a protective mechanism, it constitutes a barrier to delivering therapeutic agents to the brain. “Nano-needles” (shown as yellow tubular structures) were captured, by transmission electron microscopy, crossing the blood brain barrier cell layer (orange layer) carrying the therapeutic cargo from the blood side (darker orange-red) to brain cell side (black region).
Transmission electron micrograph. Thickness of the blood brain barrier layer is approximately 500 nanometers.
Credit line: Dr Khuloud T. Al-Jamal, Houmam Kafa, Belén Ballesteros & Serene Tay
'The Zebrafish'
This is a stereo-microscopic image of a 2-day old zebrafish. The zebrafish is a small tropical fish that has become one of the favoured animal model systems for studying gene function during embryonic development. Recently, it has become a preferred model for testing toxicity of nanomaterials. Using this testing model minimises the need to conduct research on animals.
Stereomicroscopic micrograph.
Length of the zebrafish is approximately 3 millimeters.
Credit line: Dr Khuloud T. Al-Jamal & Serene Tay
'The Chick Embryo'
This is a stereo-microscopic image of a 6-day old chick embryo. The embryo is in a stage of its development while being fed via its chorioallantoic membrane. The latter is a vascular membrane found in eggs of some amniotes, such as birds and reptiles. In mammals, this structure forms the placenta. The blood supply feeing the embryo is represented by the green fluorescence. This type of research is important to screen drugs that could stop the vascularisation of cancer, stopping its nutrient supply and thus killing it. This class of agent is called anti-angiogenic agents. Using this testing model minimises the need to conduct research on animals.
Stereomicroscopic micrograph.
Diameter of the chick embryo is approximately 3 millimeters.
Credit line: Dr Khuloud T. Al-Jamal & Serene Tay
'THE GRAPHITE'
This is a scanning electron micrograph of graphite. Graphite is used to generate the wonder-material graphene, discovered in 2004 by Geim and Novoselov, following different types of preparation methods. This image shows the multi-stack of graphene layers forming micrometre-scale graphite. Graphite was shredded into smaller pieces by dry milling. Different colour shades reflect different thicknesses of the material.
Scanning electron micrograph.
Diameter of the graphite is approximately 10 micrometers.
Credit line: Dr Khuloud T. Al-Jamal, Houmam Kafa, Noelia Rubio, Belén Ballesteros & Serene Tay
'THE GRAPHITE 2'
This is a scanning electron micrograph of graphite. Graphite is used to generate the wonder-material graphene, discovered in 2004 by Geim and Novoselov, following different types of preparation methods. This image shows the multi-stack of graphene layers forming micrometre-scale graphite. Graphite was shredded into smaller pieces by dry milling. Different colour shades reflect different thicknesses of the material.
Scanning electron micrograph.
Diameter of the graphite is approximately 10 micrometers.
Credit line: Dr Khuloud T. Al-Jamal, Houmam Kafa, Noelia Rubio, Belén Ballesteros, & Serene Tay