Medical Lecture On Brain Disorders
By Sonia K.

Bandar Seri Begawan - The Institute of Medicine, Universiti Brunei Darussalam will be holding a medical lecture entitled "The Mother, The Child and Their Brain: Understanding The Role of Sex Steroids in Disorders of The Brain" on Tuesday, February 13, at 7.30pm in the Senate Room, Chancellor Hall.

The lecture will be conducted by Dr Oduola Olakunte Abiola, a senior neuroscience lecturer teaching at the Institute of Medicine.

The amount of gonadal steroids increases phenomenally in women during pregnancy and falls in the same manner during the puerperium. Those gonadal hormones cross the blood brain barrier, and the significant variations in their plasma levels during the perpartum period has been implicated in the aetiology of postpartum psychiatric disorders.

Interestingly, neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and Cruezfeldt-Jacob (CJD) - along with its new variant (vCJD) - show a gender difference in disease susceptibility and/or course, making sex steroid hormones obvious for candidates up for study in understanding their aetiopathogeneses.

Experimental transmission of BSE to mice is gender dependent thus providing us with a powerful paradigm for studying the biology of neurodegeneration and other brain related disorders that may involve gender associated biological substrates. Identification of these substrates may suggest new therapeutic approaches, or minimally elucidate the basic mechanisms of those diseases.

During the lecture, Dr Abiola will present data relating to the role of female sex steroids in systems. Relevant to psychotic illness using a mouse model of the peripartum period, followed by data on the experimental transmission of BSE to mice as a model of neurodegeneration.

He will conclude his talk by presenting a model to dissect the hypothesised mechanistic pathway; this hopefully will be the direction of his research at his Experimental Neurochemical Pathology Laboratory over the next few years.

The lecture is part of a series organised by the Institute of Medicine to be a socially responsible institution, and to promote in learning by the people of Brunei. It is CME and CNE accredited and registration is free. Interested members of the public and health professionals are welcomed.-- Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin

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