BOMP team recognised for driving innovation and discovery
The team in the Biological Optical Microscopy Platform (BOMP) have received a Melbourne Research Excellence Award for building capability and supporting the research community.
Image: Members of the BOMP team (Sangwon Yoo, Kalyan Shobhana, Paul McMillan, Jinny Chang, Ellie Hyun-Jung Cho)
The Biological Optical Microscopy Platform (BOMP) is key to driving innovation and scientific discovery at the University and beyond, providing research support and access to 19 high-end optical microscopes worth $10.5M.
As a research infrastructure platform, part of the Melbourne Advanced Microscopy Facility, BOMP offers services in Optical Microscopy. Dr Paul McMillan, Manager of BOMP in the Department of Biochemistry & Pharmacology, said the platform team - including Ellie Hyun-Jung Cho, Gabriela Segal, Kalyan Shobhana, Sangwon Yoo, Madel Tutor and Lu-Yi Wang - helps research groups to perform their own research and create the best data possible.
Our primary role is to support researchers to best perform their microscopy experiments including assisting along the full experimental workflow - from experimental planning, through to sample preparation, image acquisition, data analysis and presentation.
Last year, 388 researchers from 17 departments across 3 faculties and 10 external institutes utilised the platform's microscopes for over 30,000 hours. The BOMP team provided 87 project consultations, 250 instrument trainings, and supported $30M in research grants resulting in 91 publications.
It's this support that has resulted in the team being recognised this year with the Melbourne Award for Excellence in Enabling Research.
As a team that provides a service to researchers, we don’t get to experience the traditional successes that researchers do, such as a successful experiment, getting a grant or publishing a paper. The team works very hard supporting our researchers and this Award shows that the larger university community values and appreciates our efforts.
Professor Matthew Watt, Head of Department, Anatomy & Physiology said that the BOMP team provides outstanding support and guidance to the research programs from across the Department.
“My own group continues to leverage the skills and expertise of the BOMP team to enhance our research projects study metabolic diseases. These interactions have recently resulted in ECR grant funding for a number of projects.”
About the Melbourne Research Excellence Awards
The Awards recognise outstanding contributions towards the delivery of high-impact research and the building of a world-leading research community.
Award for Excellence in Enabling Research
This Award recognised transformative initiatives at institutional or local level that build research capability or provided support that was essential to the success of a research activity.