Media releases

• Researchers tackling allergies and climate change receive CFI funding

  Tuesday, August 15, 2017 | By Brock University

  MEDIA RELEASE: 15 August 2017 – R00143

  Understanding immune cells and their link to allergies, and mapping the impacts of climate change in Canada’s north are two Brock University research projects that received funding from the Canada Foundation for Innovation, Minister of Science Kirsty Duncan announced today (Aug. 15).

  Researchers Adam MacNeil and Kevin Turner received a total of $311,821 from the Canada Foundation for Innovation’s John R. Evans Leaders Fund (JELF), which enables leading researchers to purchase equipment for their work.

  MacNeil, Assistant Professor in the Department of Health Sciences, studies how mast cells, which evolve from bone marrow stem cells, cause inflammation associated with allergies.

  “We’re looking at the molecular and genetic changes that happen to bone marrow-derived stem cells to allow them to become mast cells,” explained MacNeil. “We’re interested in how those mast cells function, and whether or not we can find innovative strategies to target mast cells and block their ability to create allergic inflammation.”

  With his JELF funding, MacNeil will purchase a cell sorting and analysis suite — a group of instruments that will allow him to suck out and isolate stem cells developing into mast cells for intense examination.

  Turner, Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography and Tourism Studies, researches how climate change impacts are transforming the landscape of a lake-rich area of the Yukon called Old Crow Flats. He is mapping how carbon moves through the complex lake and river system as permafrost thaws.

  With his JELF funding, Turner will obtain drones and GPS systems that he will use to create three-dimensional maps twice each season over several years. These maps will be used with sampled sediment, vegetation and water to document rates of landscape changes and associated influences on the carbon balance, as well as river and lake environments.

  “It is important for us to continue development of innovative and integrated approaches to monitor landscape changes and impacts across vast northern regions,” Turner said. “Findings will improve predictions of how these important landscapes will respond to future climate change.”

  The John R. Evans Leaders Fund is used by the CFI to help Canadian institutions attract and retain top researchers, by providing the infrastructure they need to remain or become leaders in their field.

  Brock’s Interim Vice-President Research Joffre Mercier said it is gratifying for the University to receive funding that is earmarked for the country’s most significant research projects.

  “This will enable two of our researchers to make significant contributions to Canada’s health care and environmental conservation efforts,” he said. “We’re all very proud of the exceptional research performed at Brock, and I look forward to seeing the results.”

  For more information or for assistance arranging interviews:

  * Maryanne Firth, Writer/Editor, Brock University maryanne.firth@brocku.ca, 905-688- 5550 x4420 or 289-241-8288

  Brock University Marketing and Communications has a full-service studio where we can provide high definition video and broadcast-quality audio.

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  Categories: Media releases

• Brock neuroscientist studying early autism detection in the brain

  Monday, August 14, 2017 | By Brock University

  MEDIA RELEASE: 14 August 2017 – R00142

  Neuroscientist Sid Segalowitz is on a mission to determine how early the development of autism can be detected in a child’s brain.

  “Autism is one of those conditions where, if they can diagnose it early, then intervention can have a huge beneficial effect,” said Segalowitz, a professor in Brock’s Department of Psychology. “But we have got to get it early because the brain is developing quickly and we can influence the brain development pattern more the earlier we start.

  “We have some sense of how the brain may be developing differently in children who have been diagnosed with autism, but does this manifest itself right after birth?”

  To answer this question, an international research team based at McGill University has turned to Segalowitz and his Brock research team, who are widely recognized for their ability to record and interpret brain waves gathered by an electroencephalogram (EEG).

  The cerebral cortex of the human brain is constantly active with electrical impulses that regulate everything from our thoughts to emotions to speech. These brainwave patterns are recorded on the EEG through sensors placed on the scalp. From these patterns are drawn the systematic responses of electrical activity, called the Event-Related Potential (ERP), which happen when someone views a picture, listens to a sound or experiences any other such stimulus.

  Segalowitz and his colleagues have documented how specific neural patterns are related to a wide range of human behaviour, particularly risk-taking, anxiety and aggression in adolescents.

  Researchers from McGill, Harvard University, the University of Washington Autism Centre and Birkbeck, University of London asked Segalowitz to clean up and help interpret EEG data gathered from hundreds of children, from newborns to toddlers a few years old. The international team deemed these babies to be at risk of autism mostly because their older siblings were identified as having the disorder.

  Segalowitz accepted, and says the collaboration could open up new frontiers of awareness.

  “Most of our knowledge about brainwave patterns as they relate to information and emotional processing come from adults and not from babies, so this is exploratory. The patterns in infants are not so straightforward.”

  This is partly because there is a lot of “noise” in EEG brainwaves — patterns in the data coming from movements rather than thoughts. He said electrical signals in parts of the brain that control movement are large, and tend to override a baby’s thinking or emotional signals.

  The work has its challenges. Babies sleep very well, but fuss a lot. It can also be challenging to get a six-month-old to focus on a screen to view pictures. Then it takes time to establish if certain brain patterns are over- or under-responsive “because we don’t know in advance which is the right level.”

  Segalowitz and his team scrutinize EEG results for discernable patterns, and compare brainwaves of autism-vulnerable babies to those with no family history of autism. But he says many children with autism don’t have the same pattern of “cortical pruning” as other children. Typically, neurons, dendrites, synapse and other brain structures cause the cerebral cortex to “grow madly and very quickly.”  But then the brain “prunes” itself, reducing the structures not well used to make room for new development, resulting in the cortex getting thicker and then thinner.

  “There’s evidence to suggest that in autistic children, the brains don’t get thinner. So now the question is, ‘what is going on?’ It may be that the fine-tuning is not there, which is part and parcel of this symptom of being very sensitive to sensory input.”

  However, Segalowitz cautions against taking a ‘cause-and-effect’ view of autism, saying the condition is highly complicated, with many influencing factors.

  Segalowitz and his colleagues are also applying this EEG expertise in other mental health-related projects, including a long-term study on adolescent brain growth and risk-taking behaviours, and on the brain growth and response patterns of young adults with cerebral palsy.

  For more information or for assistance arranging interviews:

  * Maryanne Firth, Writer/Editor, Brock University maryanne.firth@brocku.ca, 905-688- 5550 x4420 or 289-241-8288

  Brock University Marketing and Communications has a full-service studio where we can provide high definition video and broadcast-quality audio.

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  Categories: Media releases