Translational Research Symposium Speaker Spotlight - A/Prof Menno C. van Zelm

A/Prof Menno C van Zelm

Monash University's 3rd annual Translational Research Symposium is being hosted by its three metropolitan clinical schools on 31 July 2017. The symposium will host a diverse group of medical researchers presenting their work into translational research. RSVP here.

Associate Professor Menno C. van Zelm is the head of the B cell differentiation laboratory in the Department of Immunology at Monash.

Associate Professor van Zelm will be presenting on "Primary Immunodeficiencies: Immunology lessons from nature". Abstract:
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Primary immunodeficiencies are rare inherited disorders of the immune system. Typically, patients present at young age with recurrent and severe infections. However, there is enormous clinical heterogeneity that includes late-onset of disease and non-infectious complications such as auto-immunity and malignancies. Treatment is mostly symptomatic using antibiotics and intravenous immunoglobulin substitution. Corrective treatment is only possible with stem cell transplantation or gene therapy.

Over the past 3 decades, advancements in the field of immunology and genomics have uncovered the genetic basis of disease in many patients. Such genetic diagnoses are critical for decisions regarding stem cell transplantation and gene therapy, and in several cases have formed the rationale for treatment with small molecule inhibitors.

On top of these clinical implications, functional and genetic analysis of patients with primary immunodeficiencies have provided new insights in human immunology, with the presence of a single mutant gene providing a unique human model system.

In my lecture, I will present our approach for uncovering functional and genetic defect in patients with antibody deficiencies, and how these have advanced our understanding of human immune responses.
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We look forward to welcoming Associate Professor Van Zelm for the Symposium!

More information:
Translational Research Symposium

• Date: Monday 31 July, 2017
• Time: 8:30 for 9:00am start - 7:00pm close
• RSVP here

Find out more about the symposium and our speaker program.

If you are a graduate student or early career researcher, you may be interested in the Young Investigator poster competition. See here for more details and to RSVP.