Winner of science-writing competition focuses on the `generous', self-sacrificing behaviour of human cells

Cells are remarkably generous entities - when they are being co-operative. They are more than happy to die for the good of their fellows in a "programmed cell death" known as apoptosis.

This intriguing subject formed the subject matter of this year's Royal Irish Academy's biochemistry science writing competition. Trinity postgraduate researcher Mr Gearoid Tuohy took first place with his report "Apoptosis - a message of death in the code of life?"

The competition asks undergraduate and graduate biochemistry students to write about their research work in ordinary language rather than what has been described as "hyperspeak", the highly technical language used in the lab.

Gearoid is in the second year of a Ph.D. programme at Trinity College, working with Prof Peter Humphries. He was a reluctant convert to science, but is now captivated by the research effort.

His excellent paper was a model of how to write clearly about complicated scientific subjects. He discussed apoptosis, contrasting it with necrotic cell death, and then looked at diseases where a better understanding of apoptosis could lead to new treatments.

Too much apoptotic cell death is associated with important diseases such as retinitis pigmentosa, which causes progressive loss of vision, and Parkinson's and Alzheimer's diseases. Too little cell death is the problem in cancers, where cells do not self-destruct but rather grow out of control.

The competition, which is jointly sponsored by Yamanouchi Ireland Co Ltd and The Irish Times, for the first time included a formal runnerup prize. This was won by Ms Siobhan Conroy with a paper which examined diabetes, a common disorder with an increasing incidence here.

She is a first-year Ph.D. student working in the department of biochemistry at University College, Dublin, where she is specialising in immunology and diabetes. She also did her primary degree at UCD.

Siobhan provided a very clear description of the illness in her report entitled "Type 1 Diabetes: Prevention or Cure? A game of strategies".

In easily understood terminology she explained diabetes and how researchers are working towards new approaches in treatment of the disease.

She described how genetically modified basal cells could possibly be implanted in a patient which could express insulin and so eliminate the need for daily injections. She also detailed work related to use of oral insulin forms.