2021 Alfred Research Alliance Honours information night video

The Alfred Research Alliance student information night team

If you missed our star-studded information evening on 11 August, see the video from our virtual 2021 Alfred Research Alliance student information night, now published to the CCSMonash YouTube channel.

Find out more about Honours and graduate research at the Alfred Research Alliance, featuring the research powerhouses of Monash University Central Clinical (CCS) and Public Health and Preventive Medicine (SPHPM) schools, and the Baker and Burnet research institutes. See detail at the time points below:

Successful 2021 Alfred Research Alliance student information night

The 11 August information night showcased the Alfred Research
Alliance precinct's academic and research talent. See more

Professor Robyn Slattery is Central Clinical School's Director of Education. She writes:

Huge thanks to Sharmila Ramesh (CCS Graduate Research Student Services Coordinator) and Georgia Fuller Symons (CCS Honours Student Services Officer and Department of Neuroscience PhD candidate) for running such a fabulous event.  Also thank-you to all of the contributors.  The event ran very smoothly.  

There were 220 attendees who were very active, asking 130 questions via the chat function, and very actively engaging in the break-out groups.  Neuroscience, Immunology, Australian Centre for Blood Diseases and Burnet Institute breakout groups were well attended with between 5-25 participants in each.

Congratulations to our 3MT contestants in the CCS heat!

Around 80 attended the CCS 3MT heat - congratulations to all involved - the speakers, the MC, the judges, and Sharmila Ramesh!

Central Clinical School's PhD students are passionate about their research, and today's Three Minute (3MT) heat really showcased our wonderful talent. See below for our winning presenters.

The long-term consequences of sport concussions

Georgia Symons (left) and Will O'Brien (right) are CCS PhD students
in the Monash Trauma Group and both are first authors on papers
investigating concussion in sport. See respectively
Symons et al. paper; O'Brien et al. paper

Australian football is the most popular collision sport in Australia – with an average of 6-7 concussions occurring every 1000 match hours across amateur and professional leagues. Despite this high incidence of mild traumatic brain injury, there has been little study of the long-term neurological damage associated with this sport.

Two recently published studies by the Monash Trauma Group in Central Clinical School's Department of Neuroscience looked at the long-term consequences of concussion on the sporting field. They found that indicators of brain injury in the blood and saliva can be persistently changed for years after the injury.

Georgia Fuller Symons wins 'Neuroscience in a Flash' competition!

One of Central Clinical School's 2nd year PhD students, Ms Georgia Fuller Symons, has won 1st place in Session 2 of the Monash Neuroscience in a Flash Competition. Congratulations Georgia!

Georgia's topic was "Hitting close to home: concussion in Australian collision sport". See more detail of her talk topic below.

Neuroscience in a Flash is flashing by! Final on 14 Dec

The final session of "Neuroscience in a Flash" is taking place next Monday 14 December at 12.30 - 2.00 pm. All welcome and please register here.

Our CCS graduate students who have been selected as finalists in the competition would love your support on the day:

• Wei Yeh: Investigations of multiple sclerosis and modifiable influences: the effects of vitamin D
  status and pregnancy. Wei's supervisor is Dr Vilija Jokubaitis (Neuroimmunology, Genomics and Prognostics Group, Department of Neuroscience), MSNI unit
• Muhammed Javaid: Development of personalized ‘disease-in-a-dish’ model of focal cortical dysplasia using induced pluripotent stem cells. Muhammed is supervised by Dr Ana Antonic-Baker (Epilepsy and Personalised Medicine Group, Department of Neuroscience) 
• Georgia Fuller-Symons: Hitting close to home: concussion in Australian collision sport. Georgia's supervisor is A/Prof Sandy Shultz (Monash Trauma Group, Department of Neuroscience)

Their abstracts and the link to register can be found on the Neuroflash web page.

Concussion in Australian collision sports 'under-researched'

Ms Georgia Fuller Symons, first author

on the paper, demonstrating the frame

for ocular motor function tests, one of 

the indicators of brain trauma

by Anne Crawford

Concussion sustained during collision sports including AFL and rugby, and its effects on players, is a growing issue in Australia but research into the subject is limited and lacks consensus, a paper by Monash University Department of Neuroscience researchers has found.

First author PhD student Georgia Symons said the review, which appeared recently in the Journal of Neurotrauma, found that most literature on the topic predominantly looked at North American contact sports such as ice hockey and NFL, and also European sport.