Month: April 2019

We are very excited to announce an upcoming visit of two remarkable scientists.

Shane Liddlelow (NYU Neuroscience institute, Langone Health, USA) and 

Joshua Burda (Cedars-Sinai, Los Angeles, USA).

They will star two events: 1) seminar day on ‘Astrocytes as primary players in disease and physiology’ and 2) a career development day aimed for students and postdocs: ‘Where do scientists come from’. 

To register for either or both of the events (and student/postdoc lunch), please follow the link: https://elomake.helsinki.fi/lomakkeet/97593/lomake.html

 

1)   ‘Astrocytes as primary players in disease and physiology’, 23.5 (Thursday) 10-14.30, Haartman Institute, Lecture hall 1, Haartmaninkatu 3. 

The seminar is focused on active roles of astrocytes in normal physiology and their mechanisms and contributions in disease. The seminar is of high relevance for anyone who has ever wondered what CNS cells do if something goes wrong, and whether what they do always makes sense. Spoiler: maybe not. Come and learn about ‘astrocytes the saviors’ and ‘astrocytes the killers’, and make your own conclusions. See more info below, and the detailed program will follow soon.

 

10-12am: Keynote talks by early career independent investigators: 

Shane Liddlelow NYU Neuroscience institute, USA 

Joshua Burda, Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre, Los Angeles, USA 

Reactive gliosis is found in various pathologies ranging from brain trauma to neurodegenerative diseases. Recent studies by the invited speakers, who also contributed as postdocs to work of leading astrocyte biology groups of Ben Barres, Stanford University and Michael Sofroniew, UCLA, have identified that the response of astrocytes is context-specific with primary contribution to CNS health. While reactive gliosis is critical for recovery e.g. after spinal cord injury, astrocytes may also acquire neurotoxic properties and contribute to neurodegenerative disorders and in aging The findings are currently transforming the field and a) challenge neuron-centric paradigms of central nervous system diseases b) transform the view on how the central nervous system cells react to various insults, and what reactive gliosis actually is.

12-13am: Student and postdoc lunch with speakers  (registration on first come, first served basis via link: https://elomake.helsinki.fi/lomakkeet/97593/lomake.html)

13-14.30am:

 

13.00 – 13.25  Olesia Ignatenko ‘Mitochondrial dysfunction causes cell-type specific pathology in the brain’

13.25  – 13.50  Gulayse Ince-Dunn ‘Mitochondrial control of glia-vasculature interactions in the retina’

13.50  – 14.15.  Sarka Lehtonen ‘Severe phenotype of human astrocytes in Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease

2)  ‘Where do scientists come from’, 24th, May, Friday 10-12am, Faculty club (top floor above 5th floor), Biomedicum, Hartmaninkatu 8.

A conversation-based career development seminar with visiting and local PIs. We will get to know the personal career experiences of group leaders, and openly discuss various aspects of academic life. Besides being excellent scientists, the leaders of discussion are enthusiastic about the topics of academic life and career, mentoring, and the process of growing up as a scientist. Of note, Shane was trained by the late Ben Barres, whose legacy of outstanding contribution in building the community, promoting the equality, and the mentoring ideas is worldwide appreciated and will live long after.

Don’t miss the opportunity! We will have a free format discussion, so please bring along all your questions, thoughts, fears and hopes related.

Leaders of discussion:

– Joshua Burda, Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre, Los Angeles, USA 

– Shane Liddlelow NYU Neuroscience institute, USA 

– Sara Wickström, University of Helsinki

– Liisa Kauppi, University of Helsinki

 

Supporting moderators:

– Olesia Ignatenko, PhD student

– Fumi Suomi, Post Doc

 

To register for either or both of the events (and student/postdoc lunch), please follow the link: https://elomake.helsinki.fi/lomakkeet/97593/lomake.html

The limited number of slots to meet the speakers is available, please contact olesia.ignatenko@helsinki.fi

 

Relevant publications by invited speakers:

Liddelow SA Modern approaches to investigating non-neuronal aspects of Alzheimer’s disease FASEB J 2019

Liddelow SA, et al.,  Activated microglia induce neurotoxic reactive astrocytes via Il-1α, TNFα, and C1q. Nature 2017

Clarke LE, Liddelow SA, Chakraborty C, Münch AE, Heiman M, Barres BA (2018) Normal aging induces A1-like astrocyte reactivity. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 2018

Gibson EM, Nagaraja S, Ocampo A, Tam LT, Wood LS, Pallegar PN, Greene JJ, Geraghty AC, Goldstein AK, Ni L, Woo PJ, Barres BA, Liddelow S, Vogel H, Monje M Methotrexate chemotherapy induces persistent tri-glial dysregulation that underlies chemotherapy-related cognitive impairment. Cell 2018

Yun SP, Kam TI, Panicker N, Kim S, Oh Y, Park JS, Kwon SH, Park YJ, Karuppagounder SS, Park H, Kim S, Oh N, Kim NA, Lee S, Brahmachari S, Mao X, Lee JH, Kumar M, An D, Kang SU, Lee Y, Lee KC, Na DH, Kim D, Lee SH, Roschke VV, Liddelow SA, Mari Z, Barres BA, Dawson VL, Lee S, Dawson TM, Ko HS. Block of A1 astrocyte conversion by microglia is neuroprotective in models of Parkinson’s disease. Nat Med. 2018 

 

Anderson MA, O’Shea TM, Burda JE, Ao Y, Barlatey SL, Bernstein AM, Kim JH, James ND, Rogers A, Kato B, Wollenberg AL, Kawaguchi R, Coppola G, Wang C, Deming TJ, He Z, Courtine G, Sofroniew MV. Required growth facilitators propel axon regeneration across complete spinal cord injury. Nature, 2018

Anderson Mark A, Burda Joshua E, Ren Yilong, Ao Yan, O’Shea Timothy M, Kawaguchi Riki, Coppola Giovanni, Khakh Baljit S, Deming Timothy J, Sofroniew Michael V. Astrocyte scar formation aids central nervous system axon regeneration Nature, 2016 

Ren Y, Ao Y, O’Shea TM, Burda JE, Bernstein AM, Brumm AJ, Muthusamy N, Ghashghaei HT, Carmichael ST, Cheng L, Sofroniew MV. Ependymal cell contribution to scar formation after spinal cord injury is minimal, local and dependent on direct ependymal injury. Sci Rep. 2017

Burda Joshua E, Sofroniew Michael V  Reactive gliosis and the multicellular response to CNS damage and disease Neuron, 2014

-Olesia Ignatenko

-Fumi Suomi