Nathaniel Barry, who recently returned from Germany, has provided a report on the benefits of his Convocation Postgraduate Research Travel Award. He is on the cusp of graduating from UWA with a PhD.

"As a recipient of the Convocation Postgraduate Research Travel Award, I had the privilege of traveling to Germany to network with brain cancer researchers.

My specific area of research involves investigating the potential of a promising radioactive tracer to assist in glioblastoma imaging (a rare and highly aggressive brain cancer). Additionally, there is a large national trial involving 11 treatment centres to investigate its usefulness within Australia, which I have been involved with extensively as part of my PhD, while understanding ways to use artificial intelligence to automate, improve and accelerate the adoption of this new type of imaging.

Firstly, I attended the European Association of Nuclear Medicine conference in Hamburg, a central hub of medical research into using nuclear medicine to manage and cure all kinds of cancers. Here I engaged with other passionate researchers and industry stakeholders to better understand the landscape of nuclear medicine and how it may be used to improve glioblastoma patient care here in Western Australia.

Secondly, I visited a Charité Hospital campus in Berlin to meet with a neuroradiologist to foster potential collaborations in the future.

Lastly, I visited the Institute for Neuroscience and Molecular Imaging, located in Jülich, to meet a team I was collaborating with on a study, which was later accepted for publication in the prestigious Journal of Nuclear Medicine.

The professional development from this travel has been instrumental to the success of my PhD and I am forever grateful to the Convocation for giving me this opportunity."