Leaving a legacy: Silvia Fuhrman
Dr Murray Fuhrman was one of a group of Jewish Americans who were given a warm welcome by the University’s School of Medicine in the 1920s and 1930s when they were barred from studying at medical schools in the United States. When Dr Fuhrman’s widow Silvia Fuhrman died recently, she left a bequest in her will in memory of her husband and to thank the School for providing this opportunity.
Thanks to Silvia Fuhrman’s generous bequest, The School of Medicine was able to purchase a Jess Simple Western System (JESS) to enable research scientists to identify proteins, analyse their expression levels and understand their role in kidney cancer, amongst other diseases. This will help – in combination with other methodologies – to provide biomarker signatures to further stratify treatment regimens for patients with kidney cancer.
‘Western blotting’ is an important technique used for protein analysis, but it is a time-consuming process that is prone to error and variability. The JESS system automates protein separation and immunodetection of traditional western blotting and eliminates many of the error-prone steps. It also delivers fully analysed results in just three hours. The improvements offered by JESS will enhance research by delivering fast, reliable, and quality data.
Professor David Harrison of the School of Medicine said: “We are so grateful for this generous donation, which allows us to be more productive when using small and precious samples of donated human tissue.”