It was a day to celebrate awe-inspiring ideas and discoveries at the Research Day 2023 of the John Curtin School of Medical Research (JCSMR).

About 25 speakers presented to a packed audience on 8 August 2023 at Finkel Theatre, making it yet another successful event organised by JCSMR.

The research topics ranged from data science and AI, neural dynamics, anti-viral immunity, cancer treatment to genetics and precision medicine. Researchers had lively discussions about topics such as cellular mechanisms of epilepsy and whether a B cell can eat a parasite!

The Research Day consisted of four sessions chaired by Associate Professors Brian Billups, Riccardo Natoli, Anne Bruestle and Marian Burr.

At the opening remarks, the School Director Professor Graham Mann explained the purpose of having a research day - to share and understand each other's programs and exciting new ideas. He elaborated the importance of building new links through a focus on sharing areas of strength while enjoying the science.

"We work to reveal the complex biology that matters to human health. Our areas of focus are the deep mysteries of immunology, cancer, genomics, neuroscience and so on.

“We, thereby, aim to drive impact on individual and population health by developing solutions for cancer, infectious diseases, immune and neurological disorders," said Professor Mann.

In his presentation, he showed some significant milestones of JCSMR's remarkable journey. Professor Mann also presented the recent upgrades of the facilities in view of JCSMR’s 75th anniversary.

Participants won valuable gift vouchers for ‘the best audience questions’ as well as from lucky draws. JCSMR Research Day 2023 ended on a high note with a fellowship at the Foyer. 

Following were the presentations at the event:

Session I - Chair: Associate Professor Brian Billups
Professor Elizabeth Gardiner - The unconscious platelet bias
Dr Xin (Andy) Gao - Can a B cell eat a parasite?
Short pitch: Dr Madhu Perumal - Neural dynamics during binocular rivalry
Short pitch: Dr Nadine Hein - Ribosomal DNA repeats in disease
Stephanie Palmer - JCSMR research infastructure updates
Short pitch: Assoc. Prof. Dan Andrews - Data science and AI for precision phenotyping
Invited speaker: Dr Adam Carroll - Research School Chemistry, Joint Mass Spectrometry Facility Manager - Mass spectrometry in drug discovery

Session II - Chair: Associate Professor Riccardo Natoli
Professor David Tscharke - Crunching the numbers that underlie anti-viral immunity
Short pitch: Dr Rita Ferreira - The role of UBF in developement and disease
Associate Professor Tamás Fischer - Is TREX-2 complex an mRNA export receptor?
Short pitch: Professor John Bekkers - Cellular mechanisms of epilepsy
Invited speaker: Dr Emily Furlong - Research School of Biology, Group Leader - An introduction to the Bacterial Structural Defence Lab at ANU

Session III - Chair: Associate Professor Anne Bruestle
Professor Leonie Quinn - Functional genomic approaches to understand brain cancer
Dr Ehsan Kheradpezhouh - The role of cortical TRP channels in health and disease
Short pitch: Dr Teresa Bonello - Determining how YAP and TAZ promote tumorigenesis in advanced breast cancer
Short pitch: Dr Ainsley Davies - Canberra Clinical Phenomics Service - Sophisticated analysis of patient samples enabling precision medicine
Dr Tanya Soboleva - Therapeutic targeting of H2A.B for cancer treatment
Short pitch: Dr Rippei Hayashi - Retroviruses find their home in ovaries - lesson from Drosophila
Invited speaker: Professor Eric Stone - Research School of Biology, Group Leader - ‘Reverse engineering biological systems’

Session IV - Chair: Associate Professor Marian Burr
Professor Eduardo Eyras - Integrating research in computational biology and biomedicine - challenges and opportunities
Short pitch: Dr Viviane Delghingaro-Augusto - Targeting extracellular histones with small polyanions to prevent cell injury in sepsis and other NET-related diseases
Professor Ehsan Arabzadeh - Neural correlates of selective atiention
Short pitch: Professor Si Ming Man - Creating an ecosystem for the study of innate immunity
Professor Ruth Arkell - New approaches to understand the genetic architecture of Holoprosencephaly

Some highlights of the event:

Images Kassapa Senarath | JCSMR Communications

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