Researchers

Dr Lauren Eyssen

Staff Scientist

About

Lauren has a PhD in Biochemistry from the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa where she was focussed on developing diagnostics for animal African trypanosomiasis by targeting several proteases using both antibodies and single chain variable fragments (scFvs). During her first postdoc in the same laboratory, she investigated the identification of scFvs which could be utilised as safer alternatives to the human-infective trypanosomes currently used in diagnostic assays.

For her second postdoc, Lauren moved to Poland and worked at the Wrocław University of Science and Technology where she investigated the activity of neutrophil proteases in children with neutropenia using synthesised activity-based probes. Her third postdoc brought her to the Rosalind Franklin Institute where she focussed on improving the efficiency and consistency of the nanobody discovery platform. In this role, she supported the training of new team members and visiting researchers, while helping to streamline workflows, increase throughput and embed best practices across the platform.

Lauren is now a Scientist at the Franklin and currently manages the day-to-day operation of the nanobody discovery platform. Her interests centre on the continual development and optimisation of the platform through a range of projects, as well as the application of nanobodies in the development of rapid diagnostics.

Projects and Platforms

Nanobodies Discovery Platform

Nanobodies are single domain antibodies derived from the unique heavy chain only immunoglobulins of camels, llamas, and alpacas.

Disease X

The World Health Organisation lists Disease X (the name for a currently unknown pathogen that could cause a future epidemic) as a very serious threat to human health. To prepare for Disease X, we are building a pipeline to rapidly identify, and test nanobodies, for detecting and potentially treating future viral diseases

Applying artificial intelligence to accelerate the discovery of anti-viral nanobodies

Nanobodies are single domain antibodies derived from the unique heavy chain only immunoglobulins of camelids. Their rapid generation is important for pandemic preparedness as they can be used in diagnostic tests. We will use machine learning tools to accelerate the discovery of nanobodies to norovirus, which causes stomach flu.

Publications