7/1/2007 -> 9/1/2007

The Joint Society for Neuroscience International Affairs Committee/National Academy of Sciences Committee to the International Brain Research Organization (IAC-USNC/IBRO) in collaboration with IBRO annually sponsor students to participate in courses at the Marine Biology Laboratory (MBL), Woods Hole, MA, USA and Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Cold Spring Harbor, NY, USA. The students are all IBRO Alumni, having taken part either in IBRO Neuroscience Schools or the Visiting Lecture Team Programme. In the summer of 2007 eight international students were sponsored to attend courses.

In addition, the IAC-USNC provided a travel fellowship for each of the MBL and CSHL fellows to attend the 2007 Society for Neuroscience meeting in San Diego.

The researchers report on their experiences.

James O. Olopade, DVM, PhD., Dept. of Veterinary Anatomy, University of Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria.

“I arrived at MBL Woods Hole on 2 June and the programme started in earnest the next day. The Electrophysiology aspect was very challenging. Apart from the honour of being taught by notable researchers such as Clay Armstrong, Chris Miller and Rod Mackinnon, the depth of the work was significant and contained elements that I was not used to. The way I went about this was to put in extra reading after the day’s work. The high calibre of teachers and teaching in the optical imaging and molecular biology section were also rewarding and inspiring to me. Even more rewarding was the willingness of the faculty to communicate with us as individuals, and their interests and inputs into our personal work. The Monday evening lectures by accomplished scientists expanded my horizon and educated me on the way science was going.

"The laboratory sessions, though intense, were exciting particularly when we got results from the experiments we tried out by ourselves. Faculty members and technical assistants introduced a personal touch to the research work and were eager to see how my own work could be of importance to what they were teaching.

"I am particularly grateful to the Director of Admissions,  Lenny Dawidowicz  and his administrative staff, who took pains to address any difficulties I had. The course directors Ed McCleskey and Rae Nishi were so nice and caring. They were concerned to know if as the first African student in the Neurobiology course I was coping and adapting to what was my first visit to the United States.

“And as the question goes, “After Woods Hole, what next?” The answer to that was given by IBRO when I was awarded a post-doctoral fellowship, which, because of my experience at Woods Hole, I believe I will be able to cope better with. My long term plan is to return to Nigeria after the post-doctoral fellowship but try to obtain an RO3 NIH grant so that I can continue my research in Nigeria, lift it to acceptable international standards and have a positive impact on upcoming scientists in my country.

“On returning home, I gave a seminar in my department entitled “An Ibadan lecturer at the prestigious Woods Hole Laboratory (USA): A reappraisal of the future” The talk, which was well received, publicized Woods Hole and IBRO.

“One way I would like to see IBRO assist Africans in the future is to help those they have trained who have decided to return to Africa to work. This can be achieved by research grants geared towards building laboratories that attempt to solve indigenous neuroscience problems in Africa. Such grants could be renewed based on research output.

"Once again I wish to thank immensely SfN/IBRO for the huge financial support that was given me to attend the course at Woods Hole.”

Luis Pérez-Cuesta, University of Buenos Aires, Argentina.

“I took the Neurobiology course at the MBL this summer. I work with crabs on memory at the University of Buenos Aires. Over the last few years, I have studied memory reconsolidation and extinction processes at phenomenological and mechanistic levels, using behavioural and pharmacological approaches.

“When I applied for this course I was expecting to have the opportunity to expand my scope in neuroscience by learning many new techniques that would complement my background on behaviour and thus expand the approach to the questions I address. Thanks to IBRO, I had the unique occasion to attend the course this summer.

“Beyond my expectations, this has been the most exciting learning experience I ever had. The opportunity to learn from the most recognized scientists in the field was invaluable. One could feel not only their vast experience but also their incredible commitment to teaching. Working with them side by side, designing and performing the experiments was so motivating; I just couldn't think of a better way to learn. And all this was done in such a friendly, enthusiastic and stimulating atmosphere that it was also really enjoyable.

“And besides the strictly academic, I found this course to be a great personal experience. Both to share eight weeks with a few students in tight interaction and also to discover the entire MBL community was really exciting. Not only did I acquire many new skills and theoretical knowledge that have broadened my view into neuroscience, but I also met a lot of interesting people, whom I hope to see again in the future.

“Once again, I am deeply thankful to IBRO for making this experience possible.”

Sadiq Yusuf, Dept. of Physiology, Kampala International University, Uganda.

“I am a lecturer in the Dept. of Physiology, School of Health Sciences, Kampala International University, Uganda. I obtained my PhD in Physiology, October 2004. My research interest has been on elucidating the mechanisms involved in the regulation of communication between neural cells, e.g. by what extracellular information is the communication between neurons or glial cells regulated, and by what mediators is it communicated in the cells.

“This summer I attended the MBL Summer Course on Neural System and Behavior 2007, Woods Hole, with the help of funds provided by IBRO. I am deeply grateful to IBRO for giving me this tremendous opportunity to take an invaluable step in my research career. The course was one of most valuable scientific experiences I ever had. NS&B provided me with hands-on training in utilized state of the art experimental techniques, which I believe will improve my research career tremendously.

“These techniques included immunohistochemistry, intracellular and extracellular recordings from neurons, patch clamp and dynamic current clamp recordings of different voltage-dependent currents, using different in vitro and in vivo preparations. The course also gave me the opportunity to meet experienced researchers, trained in many widely ranging aspects of neuroscience, as well as to discuss my research plans with experts in the field of neuroscience.

“I am deeply thankful to the MBL and to IBRO for making this important contribution to my training as a researcher.”

Albert Chiang, National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS) in Bangalore, India.

Ashesh Dhawale, National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bangalore, India.

"I am doing my PhD under the guidance of Dr Upinder Bhalla at the National Centre for Biological Sciences in Bangalore. My research is aimed at analysing aspects of information transfer through the circuitry of the olfactory bulb, using two-photon microscopy in conjunction with calcium imaging. The specific question I’m trying to answer is whether the glomerulus is the unit of input representation at the level of the bulb.

“This year, with the help of IAC-USNC, I attended the course ‘Imaging Structure & Function in the Nervous System’ at CSHL. It turned out to be one of the most enriching experiences of my scientific career. Firstly, I really enjoyed the informal atmosphere during the course. I got the opportunity to interact with many of the top researchers in the imaging field, and learn the basics and beyond of several microscopy techniques, in particular, two-photon microscopy. With this knowledge, I was able to troubleshoot many of the problems I was faced during the construction of our own custom built two-photon microscope in Bangalore. In addition, I gained valuable experience working with several model systems, ranging from slice cultures to tadpoles to mice. We were also exposed to a lot of up and coming technologies, which I hope to utilize at some point in my research. Finally, I consider the scientific contacts I made as one of the most important contributions of this course to my development as a researcher."

Sergiu P. Paşca, Iuliu Haţieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Cluj-Napoca, Romania.

“In June 2007, I had the great honour of participating in the CSHL Workshop on Autism Spectrum Disorders, thanks to the kind financial support from a CSHL & IAC-USNC/IBRO Fellowship. I have been involved in autism research during the last three years, while in Medical School in Romania, working on the disturbances in the one carbon metabolism and paraoxonase status in autism.

“I went to Cold Spring Harbor with great eagerness for gaining an enriched perspective on autism. The one-week course, organized by Drs Daniel Geschwind, Pat Levitt and Sarah Spence, has certainly offered me an extensive scientific background (both basic and clinical) on the various dimensions of autism. The organizers and their invited speakers vividly illustrated to us how they, and others, are tackling the autism(s) conundrum from different angles and with a diversity of approaches, from molecular to systems level. At the same time, this Workshop offered me an invaluable opportunity to prompt the social part of the scientific life. I met brilliant students with whom I exchanged ideas and experiences, and received pertinent career advices from achieved scientists.

“A practical lesson, but also an interesting experience, was the ‘grant proposal’ competition; during the duration of the Workshop. Groups made up of students with different expertise had to choose and develop a research project and present it on the last day. This was a great opportunity for us to develop team-working skills and learn how to build heuristic critical approaches that are expected from a grant proposal.

“I believe that my participation in the CSHL Workshop is already contributing to improving and successfully concluding my current projects, and it will definitely help me during my postdoctoral studies.”

Eduardo Bouth Sequerra, Instituto de Biofísica Carlos Chagas Filho, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro.

“Last summer I went to the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories course, Advanced Techniques in Molecular Neuroscience. I applied for the fellowship because I thought this could be an important opportunity to open my mind about the near future since I am finishing my PhD thesis this year. However, I was not prepared for the surprises that were coming. I am currently working with questions regarding neuronal plasticity at a cellular not a molecular level. I thought my background in Biology and Genetics would be a guarantee that the topics and techniques discussed in the course would be familiar to me. It was not true. The course includes some methods that are not used by many people in the world. We saw neurons inside the animal using two different methods! Our group did not dissolve immediately after the course; we continue to contact each other, exchanging our experiences in bringing the learned methods home. It is an amazing time when you make good friends, work a lot, do not sleep much and nourish a lot of dreams.”

Ana Vanesa Torbidoni, Facultad de Ciencias Biomédicas, Universidad Austral, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

“This is to express my grateful acknowledgement to IBRO and the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory for awarding me a scholarship for the Advanced Techniques in Molecular Neuroscience Course at CSHL. Receiving this scholarship has been a great honour to me. Most importantly, it has given new impetus and opened new horizons in my career as a Neuroscientist.

“Attending this CSHL course immersed me in the present state-of-the-art in Molecular Neuroscience and this produced immediate benefits. I was able to use some of the procedures demonstrated on the course, particularly those about RNA amplification, which is involved in my current work. I’m at the final stage of my PhD project, on the role of endothelins in retinal cell survival mechanisms, under the direction of Dr Angela Suburo. The incorporation of new technology has already improved the quality of our work. On the other hand, the course showed me different approaches to Neuroscience problems and it is certainly helping me to decide the pathway I should follow as a post-doc.

“In addition, I wish to express my appreciation of the generosity of the instructors and assistants in sharing with us their vast knowledge and experience, as well as their constant guidance in practical and theoretical activities. Everyone involved in this course, including the administrative staff, provided us with a caring and thoughtful environment that contributed to make me feel very comfortable and stimulated rewarding discussions on science and related social problems.

“This has been a unique experience in my career as a researcher and I hope that more young investigators will be able to attend these courses at CSHL.

“I thank IBRO, and also the benefactors supporting the Course, for your confidence and willingness to help me achieve my goals in Neuroscience."