Benchmarking Spatial Metabolomics Technologies

• Honours

Spatial metabolomics is an emerging technology that enables the measurement of metabolites directly within tissue sections. Students will contribute to the design and execution of controlled benchmarking experiments comparing multiple spatial metabolomics platforms, including Shimadzu AP-MALDI, MALDI-2 and timsTOF-based imaging approaches. Using spotted metabolite standards of known concentration and spatial arrangement, students will assess analytical sensitivity, quantitative accuracy, molecular coverage, reproducibility and spatial resolution across technologies.

Students will develop skills in experimental design, mass spectrometry imaging, spatial data analysis, statistical benchmarking and scientific visualisation. The project will provide experience working with cutting-edge spatial omics technologies and generate evidence-based recommendations to guide technology selection and future applications in cancer and biomedical research.

The Brain Cancer Research Laboratory (BCRL) is a multidisciplinary team of clinicians, biologists and computational scientists developing personalised approaches to improve outcomes for patients with brain cancer. Research spans tumour evolution, spatial and single-cell omics, functional precision medicine, biomarker discovery and artificial intelligence, with a particular focus on understanding treatment resistance and identifying new therapeutic opportunities.

The lab combines advanced experimental models, including patient-derived organoids and xenografts, with large-scale multi-omic profiling and computational analysis. BCRL collaborates closely with the Brain Cancer Centre, Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, clinical partners across Australia, and international leaders in cancer genomics and spatial biology. Recent work includes the development of single-cell and spatial atlases of glioma and novel methods for multimodal data integration (Moffet et al., Neuro-Oncology Advances 2023; Freytag et al., F1000Research 2018).