News and Events
What's new?
August 2008
Snake research makes cover of Nature
Research into fanged snakes that was partly conducted at the Sansom
Institute has made the cover of the influential scientific journal, Nature.
The study challenges previously-accepted notions of how fanged snakes
evolved and helps explain the spectacular diversity of snakes seen today.
The researchers looked at fang development in 96 snake embryos covering
eight species to get a better idea of where the venomous teeth originate.
Associate Professor Tony Woods, of the Venoms Research Group at UniSA’s
School of Pharmacy and Medical Sciences, says it is most extensive study of
its kind ever to be undertaken.
Full story
July 2008
Over $1 million in ARC Linkage grants for Sansom research
Sansom Institute research has attracted over a million dollars in the latest
round of Australian Research Council Linkage grants. One of the projects
aims to help develop better treatments for mental illness, another will
focus on strategies to reduce child abuse and neglect, while a third project
will develop a workforce model to support chronic disease management.
Professor Doug Brooks successfully applied for $260,000 for a three year
research grant aimed at developing the biotechnology to enable more targeted
treatments for mental illness. Professor Brooks and colleagues from UniSA,
the Women’s and Children’s Hospital and Neubody Pty Ltd are devising a gene
delivery system to access neuronal cells, which will not only result in new
knowledge in and applications for cell biology, but also potentially lead to
a better treatments for genetic diseases that cause mental illness.
Two projects headed by Professor Leonie Segal were also successful in
gaining funding. Priority Setting in Child Protections: developing an
evidence-based strategy to reduce child abuse and neglect and associated
harms has attracted over $560,000 over five years. The study will
integrate data on the physical, psychological, educational and social costs
to society of dealing with child abuse, helping government make effective
funding decisions, with the ultimate aim of protecting Australia’s most
vulnerable children.
The other project, Development and implementation of an evidence-based
primary health care workforce planning model to support best practice
chronic disease management, will receive more than $300,000 over four
years. The model will inform government to help improve access to best-care
practice for people with diabetes and other chronic conditions.
May 2008
MATES project extended
The Veterans’ Medicines Advice and Therapeutics Education Services (MATES)
project, run by the Sansom Institute’s Quality Use of Medicines and Pharmacy
Research Centre for the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, has been extended
for a further two years. It brings the total value of the project to more
than $10 million over five years.
Now in its fourth year, the Veterans’ MATES Project has been improving the
health care of veterans by simultaneously feeding back to GPs, pharmacists
and the veterans themselves information about the quality use of medicines,
quality prescribing and management of chronic conditions such as diabetes
and cardiovascular disease in older people.
Professor Andrew Gilbert and Associate Professor Libby Roughead lead the
UniSA project team, working with the University of Adelaide’s Data
Management and Analysis Centre and Discipline of General Practice, the Drugs
and Therapeutics Information Service, the Australian Medicines Handbook, the
Repatriation General Hospital and the National Prescribing Service.
Full story
October 2007
$1.3 million boost for Sansom research
The Sansom Institute has attracted more than $1.3 million in the latest
round of National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) project
grants.
Three Sansom projects will be boosted by the funds – one looking at the
effect of maternal under nutrition on adult health, another testing new
strategies to improve kidney dialysis, and a third project examining
treatments for a debilitating genetic disease.
The Early Origins of Adult Health Research Group has been granted $528,7500
for its work looking at how maternal under nutrition around conception can
affect health later in life. The project is examining the role of the
hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis in mediating information about the
nutritional environment to the developing fetus, and whether this early
environment can ‘program’ the HPA axis to be more responsive to stressors
later in life, resulting in increased risk of conditions such as obesity,
hypertension, hypercortisolism and metabolic disease.
Meanwhile, research focussed on improving the lives of people on dialysis
for chronic kidney failure has been awarded $390,500. The project aims to
shed light on how and in what circumstances the naturally occurring compound
L-Carnitine can deliver improved health benefits for people on chronic
haemodialysis. Full story
The third project has been awarded $414,375 in NHMRC funds to examine
treatments for lysosomal storage disorder, a genetic disease that can cause
physical disability, abnormal bone growth and, in its most severe form,
death before adulthood if the patient is not treated.