University of South Australia
Research Field: Biomedical Engineering
From 5 weeks into a pregnancy, fetal cells that naturally break off from the placenta can be found in the mother’s blood stream. These rare cells, occurring about 1 in a billion of the mother’s cells, enable the non-invasive testing for a range of pregnancy conditions. However, current technologies used to isolate these cells are poor.
Dr Winter’s research has focused on developing technology that can separate these rare fetal cells from the mother’s cells. This technology in currently in the process of being further developed, and commercialised for future clinical implementation.
Marnie is passionate about science outreach and communication, spanning from national radio and television interviews and newspaper articles, organised events for National Science Week, hosted laboratory tours, and visited numerous high schools to talk about maths and science. Dr Winter received her PhD from University of South Australia, and is currently a research associate at the Future Industries Institute, University of South Australia.