With the changing landscape of Biotechnology presenting many challenges for both the industry and educators alike and the need of preparing today’s science undergraduates in the country for future industry opportunities in this sphere, Horizon Campus is currently on a quest of investing their capitol in equipping their lecture team, labs and facilities to help establish their campus as a powerhouse for Biotechnology education in the country.
Eranda Mandawala of the Department of Biotechnology, Faculty of Sciences at Horizon Campus, said, “to prepare a knowledge-based talent pool in Biotechnology requires that we invest in competence, education and research. At the campus we are assuming a national responsibility to support the growth of specialist skills and knowledge in Biotechnology and cultivate a leading community of qualified graduates in life sciences.”
“We will be making the campus a gathering place for creative researchers who are capable of linking academic disciplines in new ways to generate new knowledge and apply this for innovation and value creation in the field of Biotechnology.”
With the driving mission to ensure the campus becomes one of the best resourced centre’s for Biotechnology research and education in the country, major investments have been made in state-of-the-art laboratories to conduct impact-driven molecular research that will provide researchers with insights into how to design new drug molecules to target complex health challenges such as Cancer, Alzheimer’s Disease and antimicrobial resistance.
Mandawala explained “the biomedical challenges we face today include complex disorders associated with ageing, cancer, lifestyle and drug resistance. To develop new therapies for these diseases, we need to understand the biological activities of biomolecules in a cell.
The area of molecular and cell biology therefore have a great deal to offer medicine in the future. It is at the forefront of scientific discovery, unlocking the innermost secrets of the cell and developing new ways to detect and attack disease, provide a new generation of diagnostic and therapeutic agents, and play a major role in the development of new vaccines and other approaches to the control of diseases.”
“This also represents a platform for a new industry in Sri Lanka with new jobs, products and services in the health sector and our aim is to produce the required talent for this industry.
The lab at Horizon campus has been equipped to carry out PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction) testing, a technique that identifies characterizations of viral, bacterial, parasitic and fungal agents.”
All of these are closely aligned with undergraduate and post-graduate teaching facilities to help provide a seamless transition for students and give them many opportunities to conduct research projects in the specialized context of molecular biology.
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