QBI International Leaders in Neuroscience Seminar: 'The ageing fly nervous system'

Event Details

Date:

Wednesday, 14 February 2018 - Wednesday, 14 February 2018

Time:

4:00 pm - 5:00 pm

Room:

QBI Level 7 Auditorium

UQ Location:

Queensland Brain Institute (St Lucia)

URL:

http://www.qbi.uq.edu.au/neuroscience-seminars

Event category(s):

Full Description:: Professor Dame Linda Partridge
Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing, Cologne, Germany and
Institute for Healthy Ageing, and GEE, University College London, UK

Title: 'The ageing fly nervous system'

Abstract: Ageing is a complex process of loss of function in multiple cell types and tissues, but has nonetheless proved to be malleable to genetic and environmental intervention. Reduced activity of the insulin/insulin-like growth factor (Igf)/target of rapamycin signalling network has proved capable of ameliorating age-related decline in the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans, Drosophila and mice, and increasing genetic and phenotypic evidence points to its importance in human ageing. Drosophila is an excellent model for both natural ageing of the nervous system and neurodegenerative disease. Lowered insulin/Igf/TOR signalling can ameliorate natural age-related decline in neural function, and metabolic intervention with enhanced glucose transport can rescue the pathology associated with a fly model of Alzheimer’s Disease. The nervous system is therefore an important target for the health benefits of this intervention into the ageing process.