Prof Jo James

Prof Jo James

@drjojames.bsky.social

Placenta obsessed scientist working to better understand and predict why some babies are born dangerously small, teacher, mentor, mum, outdoor explorer. She/her

333 followers149 following31 posts

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

A shout out to various members of my team who have been spending way too much time recently in dark basements imaging bits of placenta with the new lightsheet microscope (with much troubleshooting) and processing the resulting datasets… but the results when it works! 🤩 @anzpra1.bsky.social

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

Here (in work led by Dr Anna Boss and her student Isha) we are imaging the blood vessels in the placenta (red) and the surrounding tissue (green) in 3D to see how the vascular architecture of the placenta is impacted by obesity.

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

New record - got a manuscript outcome notification today for a paper I submitted in November 2023 🤯 TWENTY-ONE MONTHS to reach a first decision of minor revisions. The system is broken. 😒 #atleastitwasntrejected

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

This helps explain why FGR placentas are smaller and less able to transport oxygen and nutrients to the baby. Knowing this will hopefully let us identify therapeutic strategies to target this upstream dysfunction, in turn improving a range of downstream consequences for the placenta.

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

This paper has been building for a while - started by gene expression work done by Teena Gamage in her PhD, and then contains almost all of Cherry Sun’s PhD work following this up in functional experiments. Amazing work by these two! 🤩

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

Fun day at the Rosehill College Hauora expo sharing our love of all things placenta, and our work aimed at better interpreting ultrasound in pregnancy to improve detection of at risk babies. New hologram was a hit (looks better irl), and tons of kids through 😃 #teamplacenta #pregnancymodellinggroup

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

Congrats to Dr Cherry Sun on officially joining the floppy hat club yesterday! 🥂🌟 Cherry’s thesis showed functional impairments in trophoblast stem cells from FGR placentae - they grow slower, die easier, & differentiate differently - which may explain placental changes seen in this disorder.

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

Super grateful for this generous philanthropic support of our work to develop sex-specific virtual placenta models, which we hope to use to develop more personalised tools to aid early identification of babies at risk of being born dangerously small. www.auckland.ac.nz/en/news/2025...

auckland.ac.nzAlumnus bolsters world-first projects at University research institutes - The University of AucklandFacebookTwitterYouTubeLinkedInInstagramWomen's RefugeUp to 30 percent of babies in neonatal intensive care will be impacted by a rare disorder. Currently, that equates to around 500 babies born each year who have a rare undiagnosed genetic disorder.
Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

My pleasure to talk about our work on data-driven models of the feto-placental circulation at #SRI2025 in Charlotte today. Thank you to the audience for so much wonderful interaction after! 🙏

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

Saw the below chart, realised that individual universities in the US can get about 5x more $ from the NIH alone than our entire country has available to apply for from its two biggest funders (HRC and Marsden, together ~$200 million NZD). Cool cool.

James Santelli@santelli.bsky.social

All this futzing with NIH research funding sure would be lousy for a region where the largest employer ranks third in NIH funding nationally. Say, what’s this?

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

👏👏👏 what BMJ said 👏👏👏

Richard Sever@richardsever.bsky.social

BMJ: "instruct[ing] scientists to withdraw or retract articles from journals is sinister...We will not retract articles on the basis that they contain so-called banned words.." www.bmj.com/content/388/...

bmj.comMedical journal editors must resist CDC order and anti-gender ideologyThe news that on 31 January 2025 the Trump administration instructed scientists employed by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to withdraw or retract articles from medical and sci...

Prof Jo James reposted

Euan Thomson
@drugdatadecoded.ca

The list of forbidden words for scientific researchers in the United States of America in the year 2025.

Darby Saxbe@darbysaxbe.bsky.social

🚨BREAKING. From a program officer at the National Science Foundation, a list of keywords that can cause a grant to be pulled. I will be sharing screenshots of these keywords along with a decision tree. Please share widely. This is a crisis for academic freedom & science.

Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

Beautiful review on the placental vasculature and is known of its altered function in pre-eclampsia by Hanna Allerkamp and colleagues at MedUniGraz👏 onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1...

onlinelibrary.wiley.comExploring the Lifeline: Unpacking the Complexities of Placental Vascular Function in Normal and Preeclamptic PregnanciesThe proper development and function of the placenta are essential for the success of pregnancy and the well-being of both the fetus and the mother. Placental vascular function facilitates efficient f....

Prof Jo James reposted

The Guardian
@theguardian.com

We can tell the truth about pregnancy without scaring women to death – in fact, it’s vital that we do | Emily Oster

theguardian.comWe can tell the truth about pregnancy without scaring women to death – in fact, it’s vital that we do | Emily OsterMany women have no idea about the potential complications until they happen. Without discussion there is no treatment or prevention There is an inherent tension between two basic facts about childbirth. On the one hand, it has happened billions and…
Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

A bit slow on this, but now there is a media piece.. stoked that Alys & I got a Marsden grant recently to further explore the biomechanical relationship between the placenta & heart in utero, and how this may impact fetal heart dysfunction in very small babies. 🥳🫀 www.auckland.ac.nz/en/news/2024...

auckland.ac.nzZooming into the womb - The University of AucklandFacebookTwitterYouTubeLinkedInInstagramWomen's RefugeA team creating virtual models of the heart and placenta to study links between low birth weight babies and heart disease has secured $1 million in funding.
Prof Jo James
@drjojames.bsky.social

Just back from a great couple of days at Tūrangawaewae marae immersing ourselves in Te Ao Maori, connecting with local communities, and having such a fun mass work sleepover. So many thanks to the #IUE team and the phenomenal maanakitanga of Tainui. Mauri ora! #teamplacenta

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