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Dr. Anees Cherkunnath received Young Scientist Award

               Dr. Anees Cherkunnath, Academic Consultant, Dept of Veterinary Physiology, CoVAS, Pookode won the young scientist award during the 24th Kerala Science congress, held at RRII, Kottayam in the category Fishery and Veterinary Sciences. Anees’s paper was on Caprine fetus - A novel source of stem cells for research and therapeutics in Veterinary Sciences done under the guidance of Dr A C Majumdar, Principal Scientist, IVRI. Dr.Anees completed BVSc & AH from Kerala Agricultural University during2005. He was MVSc First Rank holder with Gold medal and received best student award from Indian Veterinary Research Institute during 2007 and completed PhD from Indian Veterinary Research Institute during 2010. Dr.Anees had received ICAR JRF for MVSc programme and IVRI SRF for PhD programme. Areas of Interest are Embryonic Stem cell research and Reproductive physiology. He received International awards from DST, DBT and CSIR Government of India
Major Research Achievements
1. Technique developed for producing beating cardiomyocytes from fetal stem cells in goat – Patent filed (PhD Thesis)
2. Formulated novel stem media “ Extract egg” to replace FBS in embryonic stem cell culture – Patent filed (PhD Thesis)
3. Standardized the isolation and culturing of totipotent and pluripotent embryonic stem cells in goat (MVSc and PhD thesis)
4. Designed an in vivo surgical model for culturing and testing the embryos/stem cells. (PhD Thesis)
Scientific visits Abroad
1. Presented a research paper on Development and Characterization of a totipotent stem cell line in goat at World Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in Life Science, Rome, Italy -2009
2. Presented a research paper on “ Extracteeg” novel stem cell culture media at Montreal,Canada-2011August
Significance of the work presented at the 24th  Kerala Science congress
Fetal derived stem cells are proved as alternative source of stem cells to avoid the cumbersome and ethically sensitive procedure of collection of stem cells from embryos. These stem cells were cultured and developed into beating cardiomyocytes which can be used to treat the degenerative cardiac ailments.