Researcher chosen for neuroscience course

<> Researcher chosen for prestigious neuroscience course

20 February 2007

AgResearch PhD student Wendy Imlach is one of four young New Zealand scientists chosen to attend this year's prestigious Australian Course in Advanced Neuroscience (ACAN).

Wendy's research could help solve a muscle spasm condition in grazing animals that costs $100 million in lost animal production annually. It could also potentially help in the understanding of human diseases that cause tremor, loss of muscle control, co-ordination and balance.

Wendy and three other young scientists from New Zealand have received scholarships from the Neurological Foundation of New Zealand to enable them to attend the three week ACAN course that starts in April.

ACAN is Australia's answer to the legendary neuroscience training programmes held at Woods Hole and Cold Spring Harbor in the USA. Leading Australian and overseas scientists work with the attendees to provide rigorous training in the theory and practice of cellular neuroscience. Participants will attend lectures on the fundamentals of cellular neuroscience, receive extensive hands-on laboratory training using the latest equipment, and will conduct a research project of their own choosing.

Wendy says neuroscience has always interested her. "How the brain works, and how drugs and toxins work on the brain is absolutely fascinating."

She is based at AgResearch's Grasslands campus in Palmerston North and is co-supervised by Dr Steve Kerr in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at the University of Otago.

"I was lucky to be able to come to AgResearch to do my PhD in the Biomembrane group where I have been working with a group of fungal neurotoxins called lolitrems."

Funded by a Marsden grant awarded to Dr Julie Dalziel and Dr Sarah Finch, Wendy has been investigating the effects of lolitrems on ion channels in the brain. Ion channels are responsible for the electrical signalling between cells and as such are the target for many therapeutic drugs. Problems with ion channels can cause any one of a number of neurological disorders such as epilepsy, migraines and ataxia.

Wendy and her colleagues have identified the target receptor for the toxin that causes a neurological condition called ryegrass staggers. Ryegrass staggers occurs in grazing animals (sheep, cows, deer, and horses) that eat grass infected with a fungal toxin causing muscle spasms - so it makes it hard for the animals to walk and eat.

"There is no cure or control for the disease yet and all farmers can do is move their animals to fresh fields and hope the symptoms stop. It's estimated to cost New Zealand agriculture 100 million annually in lost animal production.

"So now that we know how these toxins are affecting the animals, we are much closer to finding a way to cure or prevent this condition."

Some of Wendy's research on the effects of lolitrems on motor coordination was done at Stanford University (USA) with Dr Andrea Meredith and Dr Richard Aldrich.

"Attending the course is a great opportunity because there are experts coming from all over the world to speak at it," she says.

"It'll be amazing to learn new skills and techniques that I wouldn't otherwise be exposed to here in New Zealand. And then I'll be bringing that new knowledge back to my work at AgResearch."

ENDS

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