[BIC-announce] FW: Killam Lecture - TODAY - Playing with fire: Sodium Channels and Their Roles in Diseases of the Nervous System

[Jennifer Chew, Ms.]

PLEASE DISCARD IF THIS IS A DUPLICATE.  THANK YOU.  JENNIFER 
 

Killam Lecture - TODAY
Speaker:  Stephen G. Waxman, MD, PhD
Department of Neurology, Yale University

Title:  Playing with Fire:  Sodium Channels and Their Roles in Diseases
of the Nervous System
Date:  April 1st, 2008
Place:  de Grandpre Communication Centre
Time:  4:00 pm

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Dr. Stephen G. Waxman is Professor of Neurology at Yale University.  He
received both an MD and PhD at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and
has been a professor at Yale since 1986.  His research focuses on the
general theme of functional recovery after injury to the brain and
spinal cord. A major effort is currently underway to understand the ways
in which spinal neurons build their excitable membranes, and to study
the changes that occur in these membranes in response to various
injuries. Dr. Waxman's team utilizes patch clamp, molecular biological,
pharmacological, and biophysical techniques together with computer
simulations. They have cloned a primary sensory neuron-specific sodium
channel NaN, and have demonstrated that it produces a TTX resistant
persistent sodium current. Since NaN channels are selectively deployed
in nociceptive neurons, NaN represents an important molecular target in
pain research. They have also demonstrated that there are
state-dependant changes in sodium channel expression, both in normal
neurons, and following injury to neurons (for example, following axonal
transection and demyelination). They are, in addition, interested in
calcium-mediated injury within white matter tracts, and are developing
neuroprotective strategies that should be useful in spinal cord injury,
multiple sclerosis, and related diseases.  The title of Dr. Waxman's
talk is "Playing with fire: Sodium channels and their roles in diseases
of the nervous system."

 

 

Enza Ferracane

Montreal Neurological Institute

3801 University

Montreal, Quebec  H3A 2B4

Director's Office, Rm 636

Tel: (514) 398-1903

Fax:  (514) 398-8248

Email: enza.ferracane at mcgill.ca <mailto:enza.ferracane at mcgill.ca>