Take 10 with... Inken Kelch

1. Describe your research topic to us in 10 words or less.

Leveraging advanced 3D-imaging to gain new insights into immune function. 

2. Now explain it in everyday terms!

My research focuses on investigating the immune system on the tissue level, by capturing large-scale 3D images of immune organs such as lymph nodes. These organs are the starting point for immune responses to threats like invading pathogens and cancer but the exact sequence of events that lead to successful responses is not fully understood. 

3. Describe some of your day-to-day research activities.

My work involves time in the lab preparing tissue samples and taking images using a range of different microscopes, followed by many hours of image processing and data analysis. Networking is also important to my research and attending conferences is a highlight for me: soaking up new research happening in other labs and talking to people with similar research interests never fails to spark up some new enthusiasm.

4. What do you enjoy most about your research?

There is nothing like seeing something new under the microscope and drawing up theories about what it could mean. Having the freedom to develop a new research direction is a huge privilege of the work I do.  Besides, I really enjoy working with my colleagues who are such a lovely bunch of characters.

5. Tell us something that has surprised you in the course of your research.

Research is an incredibly humbling experience, most of the time you must be prepared to have your assumptions proven completely wrong by your experiments. Once we thought rapid organ growth would strain the blood supply and leave tissues undersupplied and hypoxic, however we found that a mouse tumour could grow a full blood vessel network in only five days, half of the time it took for us to image the whole organ. Realising the time scales that cells and tissues operate in is really eye opening. 

6. How have you approached any challenges you’ve faced in your research?

Too often researchers think they are the only ones struggling with a particular problem, but once you reach out to your peers you may realise that others have faced very similar issues. Reaching out and stepping outside the box are essential survival tools. 

7. What questions have emerged as a result?

Currently my work focuses on the immune-stimulating signals that are carried into lymph nodes from the tissue and how they reach cells in different compartments. I am particularly interested in a labyrinthine tubing system that spans most of the lymph node. We still don’t fully understand why this network has evolved with this complexity and why exactly it needs to channel fluid. 

8. What kind of impact do you hope your research will have?

A picture is worth a thousand words, and I hope that an immediate impact of our work is to help others understand the complexity of the immune system better. Ultimately, the aim of our research is to uncover some features of immunity that might inform future treatments and vaccination strategies.  

9. If you collaborate across the faculty or University, or even outside the University, who do you work with and how does it benefit your research?

I have the pleasure of working closely with very talented researchers at the Auckland Bioengineering Institute who build the powerful imaging technology that is enabling my research. It is always fun to visit them and get a tour of the new instruments they have developed – it’s a bit like peeking into MacGyver’s garage! Overseas collaborations are also extremely valuable; we have recently formed good connections to researchers in Australia and the UK and were able to share new methods that have greatly accelerated our work.

10. What one piece of advice would you give your younger, less experienced research self?

Never think it’s too late to do something. Taking a bit more of a long-term view for developing a research and career strategy is worthwhile, even when it’s hard to see the bigger picture in the moment.