News & Events
Upcoming Events
Obesity and the Metabolic Syndrome - A Making Connections Symposium - 14th - 15th May 2012
Physiology Departmental Seminar Series 2012
Physiology News
Professor David Spanswick and his lab join Physiology from Warwick University, UK
Dave Spanswick graduated from University of East Anglia, UK in 1986 (B.Sc). He then obtained his PhD at University of Birmingham, studying neurophysiology.
He remained in Birmingham as a Post-doctoral research fellow in Steve Logan’s group before moving to work in Canada with Leo Renaud’s group and Japan
with Syogoro Nishi, Hideho Higashi, Hiroe Inokuchi and Megumu Yoshimura. He subsequently returned to the UK as a lecturer in the Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Aberdeen before taking a sabbatical at the Department of Pharmacology, University of Cambridge and Parke-Davis. He was appointed a senior lecturer, University of Warwick in 2000 and Professor of Molecular Neuroscience at Warwick Medical School in 2004. He arrived at the Department of Physiology, Monash University in October 2011.
IRAP Lab joins the Department of Physiology
The IRAP team, comprising Peta Burns (research assistant), Siew Yeen Chai (NHMRC Senior Research Fellow), Vi Pham (postdoctoral fellow) and PhD students Holly Yeatman, Broden Morgan and Michelle Chen, joined Monash Physiology in January 2011 from the Howard Florey Institute. The research interest of the group is zinc-dependent metallopeptidases, enzymes that generate or degrade neuropeptides. Their current research is focussed on 1 particular member of this class of enzyme, insulin-regulated aminopeptidase (IRAP), which this group discovered plays an important role in memory processing - competitive inhibitors of this enzyme were found to have robust effects on facilitating memory in normal animals and reversing memory loss in rodent deficit models. They utilise a multidisciplinary approach to elucidate the roles of IRAP in the brain in normal physiological as well as in pathological conditions. This group has also embarked on a drug discovery program to develop specific, small molecular weight compounds targeting this enzyme as a new class of cognitive enhancing drugs. They recently discovered that IRAP inhibitor treatment not only restored performance in memory tasks, it also significantly reduced amyloid plaque deposition in a mouse model of Alzheimer’s disease, strengthening the case for the development of these drugs as disease modifying as well as symptomatic treatment for AD.
A/Prof Matt Watt and Dr Zane Andrews
Healthy Brain, Healthy Body
Evidence from our laboratories shows that daily physical exercise increases the production of new neurons (neurogenesis) in areas of the brain that control appetite and energy expenditure (the hypothalamus). We have also shown that neurogenesis in obese mice occurs concomitantly with a reinstatement of sensitivity to signals responsible for energy balance. These exciting findings provide the impetus to investigate the role of neurogenesis in the regulation of energy homeostasis with implications for the treatment of obesity. This research was initially funded by the Faculty of Medicine and formed the basis of a successful the NHMRC project grant in 2010.
Read more about the Watt Lab
Read more about the Andrews Lab
New Professorial Recruit from the USA
The Department of Physiology has been lucky enough to have Professor Mark Sleeman from the Unites States join our team. Professor Sleeman was previously the Head of Metabolic Research at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals in Tarrytown, New York. For the past two decades he has been interested in the interplay between insulin resistance and obesity, and more specifically the molecular mechanisms behind the regulation food intake and body weight. To that end he and his colleagues have generated a large number of genetically modified animals to study these phenotypes. Recently, his research has focused on modulators of lipid metabolism and the development of fully human monoclonal antibody therapeutics for the potential treatment of metabolic disease. Mark Sleeman was a recipient of a Juveniles Diabetes and Ruth Kirschstein Endocrine Fellowship at the University of Massachusetts in the laboratory of Dr Michael P. Czech where he studied mechanisms insulin-resistance/signaling. Dr Sleeman received his Ph.D. from Monash University and has published numerous papers on Type 2 Diabetes and Obesity in journals such as Nature Medicine, Nature Genetics, PNAS, Journal of Biological Chemistry and Diabetes and is a member of numerous professional societies in USA and Australia.
Click here to find out more about Professor Sleeman's research.
Exciting New Developments from The Monash Vision Group
The Monash Vision Group [link to http://www.monash.edu.au/bioniceye/ is developing a brain implant that could return sight to up to 80% of clinically blind people, including patients affected by the three most common untreatable causes of blindness in Australia: diabetic retinopathy, glaucoma and macular degeneration. In many cases, these diseases eventually lead to degradation of the retina, meaning that they cannot be treated by retinally-based prostheses. The Monash Vision direct-to-brain bionic eye will convert a video signal into a pattern of electrical stimulation that can be delivered directly to the visual cortex, thus it will help people with acquired retinal diseases and those with damage to the optic nerve or eye. As no eye surgery is involved, the system is able to supplement, without degrading, any existing sight.
The group is funded by a Special Research Initiative scheme through the Australian Research Council http://www.arc.gov.au/ncgp/sri/bionic_eye.htm and involves researchers from across Monash University, the Alfred Hospital and industry partners Grey Innovation http://www.greyinnovation.com/ and MiniFAB http://www.minifab.com.au/].
Preclinical testing and development of the prosthesis is primarily being conducted in the Department of Physiology under the direction of Professor Marcello Rosa, Associated Professor Ramesh Rajan and Dr Nicholas Price. This testing will determine the best materials for a safe and long-lasting implant as well as the optimal electrical stimulation parameters for recreating a visual stimulus with high spatial and temporal resolution. This will help develop an implant that provides sufficient vision to perform everyday visually-guided activities such as recognising people, reading and navigating the world.
For more information, please direction enquiries to the Monash Vision Group http://www.monash.edu.au/bioniceye/contact.html]
