The Science and Society lecture series returns for 2025, with Professor Perdita Barran, delivering her lecture; Weighing Molecules to Diagnose Disease, from Heel Prick to Skin Swab.
Every year more than 30 million babies worldwide are screened for inborn metabolic disorders directly after birth with a heel prick assay that takes a tiny amount of blood to be analysed with a mass spectrometer.
By analysing sebum with mass spectrometry, a new method to detect Parkinson’s disease has been determined.