December 24, 2018

Student Seminar – Parity, APOE4, and Alzheimer’s Disease

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Next Monday, November 19th from 5:30-6:30 we will be having a student seminar by our own VP Academic, Nicole Minielly! Here is a short intro to her presentation:

Come join us for a student run seminar discussing Alzheimer’s disease, led by fourth year Behavioural Neuroscience student, Nicole Minielly. We will begin this seminar with a general overview of Alzheimer’s pathology and prevalence. Following this, we will be discussing past research examining how pregnancy and genetic predispositions increase the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and cognitive decline. We will also review ongoing and past research examining this phenomenon in rodent models.

Student Seminar – Impaired Glutamate Signalling in the Excitotoxic Phenotype of Huntington’s Disease

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Come join us for a student seminar led by Eden Dubchak discussing the involvement of impaired glutamate signalling in the excitotoxic phenotype of Huntington’s Disease. Huntington’s Disease is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder that produces cognitive, motor and psychiatric symptoms. Excitotoxicity, which is the damage or death of neurons caused by excessive overstimulation by an excitatory neurotransmitter, has been identified as a major pathway by which Huntington’s Disease induces neurodegeneration. The seminar will provide a brief overview of Huntington’s Disease, the evidence for excitoxicity as a pathogenic mechanism, the possible mechanisms behind impaired glutamate signaling, and how our understanding of the excitotoxic phenotype may still be incomplete.

Student Seminar – Infants From Families With Dogs Show Enhanced Communicative Development

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We hope you’ve been having a great week! We are very excited to have our first student seminar next Monday October 29th from 5:30-6:30 in IKB 185. Our very own president, Mary Zhao, will be presenting on some her research involving babies and puppies- what could be better? Here is a short intro about what to look forward to:

Come join us for a student seminar led by Mary Zhao discussing the effects of early exposure to non-human vocalizations (specifically, dog barks) on language development in infants. Understanding social-communicative intent, by following a point or gaze, is a key early milestone in infants. It underlies later joint attention and is often a predictor of subsequent language development. It is currently unclear what boosts early point and gaze understanding, but preliminary research is showing that early exposure to pet dogs supports both. During the seminar, we will be taking a deeper look into how human coevolution with dogs may have changed the way the human brain processes language.

Staci Bilbo – Associations between maternal cytokine levels during gestation and measures of child cognitive abilities and executive functioning

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Next Monday October 1 from 5:30-6:30 in IKB 185 is our first Journal Club of the year! Each Journal Club we will be analyzing an academic neuroscience paper as a group, and ensuring everyone understands the context. This week, we will be discussing a paper on the effects of cytokines released by the maternal and fetal immune system on fetal brain development. This is in preparation for the author, Dr. Staci D. Bilbo (from Harvard Medical School) to present at the Centre for Brain Health at UBC this Friday!