Congratulations to our latest PhD successes

Dr Huda Abutayyem has been awarded her PhD for her thesis Psychosocial impacts of malocclusion and orthodontic treatment in adolescent patients.

The project involved research which was part of an ongoing theme in the Orthodontic Unit.

Primary Supervisor Professor Susan Cunningham said: “Huda looked at the psycho-social aspects of malocclusion and orthodontic treatment in adolescent patients using a variety of research methods including a systematic review, a qualitative study and a quantitative questionnaire based study.

“Huda’s work has provided important new evidence to take this research forward in the future.”

Dr Abutayyem’s Secondary Supervisors were Professor Nigel Hunt and Professor Ian Needleman.

Dr Linda Liu has also received her PhD for her thesis entitled Studies on subgingival microbiota of chronic periodontitis in the presence or absence of type 2 diabetes mellitus.

Dr Liu’s PhD was based on data deriving from a number of studies conducted by Primary Supervisor, Professor Nikos Donos, and focused on an in-depth analysis of the whole subgingival plaque microbiome of patients with both Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus (T2DM) and Chronic Periodontitis (ChrP) or only Chronic Periodontitis.

Professor Donos said: “The novelty of this PhD was the use of new next generation sequencing platform compared to the targeted techniques used previously to generate data with high resolution from the phylum level down to the genus and the species level.

“Furthermore, the use of the least absolute shrinkage and selection operator enabled an open and objective analysis of this complex data overcoming some of the statistical dilemma faced in the past with such studies.

“This PhD described in a very precise manner the microbiome shift at different time intervals following periodontal therapy in both T2DM and healthy patients suffering with periodontal disease and provided information of the effect of smoking on the subgingival microbiome of this type of patients.”

Dr Liu’s Secondary Supervisors were Professor David Spratt and Dr Nikos Gkranias.