Speaker: Dr. Cong Christine Guo (National Health and Medical Research Council)  　　

Title：Multidisciplinary Research Platform for Neurodegenerative Diseases 

Time: September 28 (Thursday) 2017, 14:00pm

Venue: Laboratory of Southwestern Biodiversity, 1st floor conference room (1-24-26)

Everyone is welcome! 

Introduction of the speaker:

　Dr. Guo received a Ph.D. in Neuroscience from the Stanford University and then completed a Postdoctoral fellowship in neuroimaging and neurodegeneration at University of California, San Francisco. She went to Australia and joined Queensland Institute of Medical Research (QIMR Berghofer) in 2013, on a sponsored international research fellowship. Currently, She is the Team Head of Translational Neuroscience and holds a Career Development Fellowship from NHMRC (National Health and Medical Research Council). She has broad research experience, from molecular biology and genetics to electrophysiology and systems neuroscience, in both animal models and human research. Dr. Guo is leading several multidisciplinary studies on neurodegenerative diseases and epilepsy, combining cutting-edge brain imaging, genetics, molecular biology and clinical neuropsychology. 

Brief of the presentation

Neurodegenerative diseases selectively target subpopulations of neurons, leading to the progressive breakdown of specific brain networks. I will first discuss evidence from pathological and imaging studies on the breakdown of large-scale networks in neurodegenerative diseases, such as behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia and Alzheimer's disease. Comparative neuroimaging revealed that these networks are conserved across species, and could be fundamental to the functional organization of the brain. The progression of these network changes in clinical and preclinical models could provide key evidence in elucidating the natural history of neurodegenerative diseases.  

　　Then I will discuss the urgent need of early detection in neurodegenerative disease, where interventions have the greatest potential to avert neuronal death and later disease burden. I will introduce our strategies in establishing a younger healthy cohort enriched for high risk of dementia.  Risk prediction is enabled by recent advances in genome wide association study (GWAS) studies on Alzheimer’s study and the computation of polygenetic risk scores. Here we developed a multidisciplinary platform, which combines cutting-edge bioinformatics, brain imaging, cognitive testing and lifestyle monitoring to (1) Discover biological markers of early neuropathology; (2) Identify modifiable risk factors, and (3) Establish the very early phenotypic and neuronal signs of disease conversion. 

Key Laboratory of Animal Models and Human Disease Mechanisms　

Medical Genetics and Evolutionary Medicine

2017-09-26