Dr Russell Conduit

Biography

Russell Conduit's PhD in sleep research was conferred in October 2000. Before his PhD confirmation he worked for four years as a senior sleep technologist at the South-Eastern Private Hospital Sleep Disordered Breathing Unit. From 1999-2001 he held a position as Associate Lecturer at La Trobe University, School of Psychological Science. In order to pursue a career focused on sleep research, he joined Monash University in 2001 as a Lecturer in the Department of Psychology and Coordinator of the Department’s Human Sleep Laboratory.

Professional Activities

Russell is a member of the Australasian Sleep Society (ASA) and as a member has presented research at the International Association of Professional Sleep Societies (APSS) annual conference in 1996, 1998, 2001 and 2005. He has also acted as a reviewer for the international journal Psychophysiology. Russell is currently working with industry and international collaborators to develop pharmacological interventions for obstructive sleep apnoea using a British Bulldog animal model.

Research Interests

Russell has a wide scope of research interests, and keen to try new ideas. His expertise mainly lies in the areas of:

sleep physiology
sleep disorders & novel treatment approaches
altered states of consciousness, such as dreaming
electrophysiology.

Postgraduate Research Projects

Russell has a keen interest to supervise postgraduate research projects centred around his own areas of experience. He has previously co-supervised DPsych students from La Trobe University, and is currently supervising DPsych students at Monash. He is available for both DPsych and PhD research supervision within the School.

Potential Student Projects

Drug/Herbal Effects on Fatigue & Sleepiness

Page F, Coleman G & Conduit R (2006). The effect of transdermal nicotine patches on sleep and dreams. Physiology & Behavior, 88, 425-432.
Finch J, Martin M. Sasse A. Conduit R. (2001) The effect of Hypercium Perforatum (St. John's Wort) on salivary cortisol, subjective stress and PSG recordings. Sleep, 24: 171.

Cognition During Sleep

Jacobs D, & Conduit, R. (2005) Name discrimination from stage 2 and REM sleep. Sleep, 28: 367.

Sleep Disorders

McDonnell G. Sasse A, & Conduit R. (2001) Positive beliefs about Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) treatment are strongly related to compliance behaviour. Sleep, 24: 273.

Driving & Fatigue

Rahmanovic, KA. & Conduit, R. (2005) Personality characteristics related to the decision to drive when fatigued. Sleep, 28: 367.

Dreaming

Fedyszyn I, & Conduit R. (2006). Tone Induction of Ocular Activity and Dream Imagery from Stage 2 Sleep. Dreaming in press for December 2006. email Russell for pdf.

Teaching

Russell has a particular interest in teaching Behavioural Neuroscience, His speciality is neurophysiological recording. He has developed several teaching exercises with commercial developers of electrophysiological recording equipment. For an example of some of these teaching exercises, you can visit the AD Instuments Website.

Collaborations

Russell is currently working with industry and international collaborators to develop pharmacological interventions for obstructive sleep apnoea using a British Bulldog animal model. Collaborators include Prof John Trinder (University of Melbourne), Prof Sigrid Veasey (University of Pennsylvania), Wayne Hodgson (Dept of Pharmacology, Monash University) and Adam Tucker (Beddoes Group).

Grant Support

External
ARC- Linkage Infrastructure (2002) $100,000. Sleep-wake problems in people without primary sleep disorders (J. Redman, G. Coleman, S. Crewther, R. Conduit, D. Bruck, B. Hood, A. Richdale, A. Francis).

Internal
Monash University Research Block Grant (1999) $38,870. Sleep monitoring equipment for the study of pharmacological influences on the sleep quality of humans (G. Coleman, R. Conduit, A. Sasse & J. Redman).

La Trobe University Faculty of Science Technology & Engineering Small Grant (2000) $6500

Is Pain Perception Possible During Sleep? (R. Conduit & N. Voudouris)

Publications

Refereed Primary Publications

Conduit, R, Bruck, D., & Coleman, G. (1997). Induction of visual imagery during NREM sleep. Sleep, 20: 948-956.

Conduit R, & Coleman G. (1998). Conditioned salivation and associated dreams from REM sleep. Dreaming, 8: 243-262.

Conduit, R., Crewther, S.G., Bruck, D. & Coleman, G.J. (2002) Spontaneous eyelid movements during human sleep: a possible PGO correlate? Journal of Sleep Research, 11: 95-104.

Conduit, R. Crewther, S. & Coleman G. (2004) Poor recall of eye-movement signals from NREM sleep compared to REM: Implications for models of dreaming. Consciousness & Cognition, 13: 484-500.

Conduit, R. Crewther, S. & Coleman G. (2004) Spontaneous eyelid movements during sleep are related to dream recall on awakening. Journal of Sleep Research, 13: 137-144.

Sasse, A., Conduit, R., Ryan, D., Woods, W., & Tucker, A. (2005). A Pharmacotherapy for Obstructve Sleep Apnea. Sleep, 28: 1015-16.

Page, F., Coleman, G., & Conduit, R. (2006). The effect of transdermal nicotine patches on sleep and dreams. Physiology & Behavior, 88, 425-432.

Fedyszyn I., & Conduit R. (2006). Tone Induction of Ocular Activity and Dream Imagery from Stage 2 Sleep. Dreaming, 16 (4), in press.