Science
A day in the life: Valerie O'Donnell
Professor Valerie O’Donnell is researching how blood clots form in aneurysms – a condition sometimes called a ‘silent killer’.
06:30
I eat porridge with some fruit and nuts and take the dog for a walk. Then I drive into work at Cardiff University with my husband, who’s also a scientist, with my bicycle in the boot.08:45
I first check in with our facility manager who is in charge of our instruments. Our lab focuses on how certain types of fatty molecules are involved in blood clots forming.
Blood clots are made from red blood cells, white blood cells, and platelets that are always in our blood, plus a net-like substance called fibrin that forms during clotting and holds it all together. It’s quite unique in our biology – a liquid becoming a solid in a short space of time.
If we injure ourselves, a blood clot will stop the bleeding. But when blood clotting goes wrong it causes major problems. And there’s an increased risk of blood clots in almost all diseases, from cardiovascular diseases to cancer, the flu and Covid-19.
We know what’s in blood clots but we don’t fully understand how they form. Platelets and white blood cells help signal to the blood to clot. We are researching how certain fatty molecules could be involved in this process.
10:00
The more senior you get, the less time you spend hands-on in the lab. Very rarely I might get half a day to help my team extract the fatty molecules from the blood samples we are investigating.To do this, we dissolve our samples in an acidic solution and a solvent. The fatty molecules dissolve into the solvent. You know how vinegar and oil don’t mix? The acidic solution is like the vinegar, and the solvent is like the oil. They form two separate layers. We use a pipette to take off the solvent layer and take the fatty molecules from that.
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We use a machine called a mass spectrometer to measure the levels of fatty molecules in our samples. A postgraduate student I’m supervising might show me their mass spectrometry graphs, and we’ll spend time looking at them.
My team’s BHF-funded work is focused on how blood clotting is involved in the development and growth of abdominal aortic aneurysms. This is when a bulge forms in the wall of the aorta, the main blood vessel coming out of the heart. Symptoms aren’t always obvious and if the aneurysms bursts, the bleeding can be deadly. It’s sometimes called a ‘silent killer’.
There are currently no specific drug treatments available. If the aneurysm grows too large, surgery may be needed but this also risks causing heavy bleeding. To find a drug treatment to stop the aneurysm getting to this point, we need to understand the biology of what’s happening.
To do this, we’re analysing blood and tissue samples donated by around 90 people who had surgery to repair their abdominal aortic aneurysm.
15:00
Some days we have a group meeting, so everyone is up to speed on what everyone else is doing. For our aneurysm study, we need expertise from different areas. I’m a biochemist specialising in fatty molecules.I’ve brought together scientists who are world leaders in their respective areas
We’re also collaborating with experts on blood clotting from Cardiff and Aberdeen, a BHF-funded professor from the University of Cambridge who’s an expert on aneurysms; and a surgeon out of Oxford who provided the tissue samples. I’ve brought together scientists who are world leaders in their respective areas.
After my last meeting, I cycle home; sometimes I get home first to let out the dog and then work for a couple hours.
18:00
After something simple for tea, I might spend a few hours working on ceramics – I’m doing a part-time Master’s at the Cardiff School of Art and Design.I’ve spent years looking at cells in labs and their patterns are often reflected in my ceramics.
Interestingly, clay particles are called platelets. When clay is fired, the platelets use heat energy and calcium to stick together and form a solid piece of ceramic. With blood clots, there are blood platelets that interact with calcium and energy to create a solid clot.
I thought my ceramics hobby would be something completely different from work, but the similarities are fascinating.
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