Stroke is one of the leading causes
of death and disability in Australia
with over 55 000 people
suffering from stroke each year.
The major focus of my research has been
on the process of adult neurogenesis.
This is the process by which new neurons
are continuously generated in our adult brains
throughout life.
This only occurs in various distinct
regions of the brain
and we want to be able to harness this
ongoing neuron production potential
in our brains
to produce new neurons to combat conditions
such as stroke
where neurons are lost or damaged.
During the process of adult neurogenesis
a large number of the proliferating cells
actually die before they mature
to become functional neurons.
And we showed that this cell death
is actually due to a recently described form
of cell death called ferroptosis.
This is actually regulated by
the dietary trace element selenium.
When there's increased levels of selenium
in the diet or in the blood
then this will decrease the levels
of this type of cell death.
We've been investigating whether
dietary seleniums can improve
the stroke outcomes in a mouse model
of hippocampal stroke.
In the longer term we hope that
our fundamental stroke research
will lead to novel strategies
to either reduce the amount of cell death
or increase the number of new neurons
that are generated following stroke
that will hopefully lead to
improved clinical outcomes.
 
