SHANGHAI, Feb. 25 -- A medical student at a prestigious university in Shanghai has appealed on Tuesday against the death sentence he received for murdering his roommate with lab poison in April of last year.

The appeal of Lin Senhao, a postgraduate at Fudan University, will put the case into a second instance trial soon, according to sources with Shanghai No. 2 Intermediate People's Court.

The court convicted Lin of intentional homicide in the first trial verdict on Feb. 18. It handed down a death sentence for Lin while depriving him of his political rights for life.

Lin used N-Nitrosodimethylamine, a deadly chemical compound he took from the university lab, to contaminate a water dispenser in their dormitory on March 31 of last year. His roommate, Huang Yang, drank from the dispenser on April 1 and died of organ failure days later despite doctors' efforts to save him.