Professor Kit Fairley: Why sex work legislation matters to everyone. Find out more on 30 September 2015

Professor Christopher ('Kit') Fairley is Director of the Melbourne Sexual Health Centre (MSHC) and Professor of Public Health at Monash University. He holds three specialist medical fellowships from the College of Physicians. He is an editor of the Journal 'Sexual Health'. His principal research interests are the public health control of sexually transmitted diseases and the effectiveness of clinical services. He holds a current NHMRC program grant, has supervised over 20 doctoral students to completion and has about 450 publications. Prof Fairley will be speaking at the forthcoming 30 Sept Translational Research symposium hosted by Central Clinical School. See detail below.

Professor Euan Wallace: How basic science informs clinical trials. Lessons from perinatal medicine. Find out more on 30 Sep 2015

Professor Euan Wallace is the Carl Wood Professor and Head of Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology, Monash University and Director of Obstetric Services, Monash Health. Professor Wallace will be speaking at the forthcoming 30 Sept Translational Research symposium hosted by Central Clinical School. See detail below.

Publication: Oats and goat's milk - Case studies on becoming allergic to food via skin products

L-R: Dr Sara Prickett, Prof Robyn O'Hehir and Prof Jenny
Rolland.

Goat milk first, now oats are revealed by Monash allergy researchers to be allergenic ingredients in skin care products.

"Food is meant to be eaten, not rubbed into inflamed skin," said Professor Robyn O'Hehir, Director of Allergy, Immunology and Respiratory Medicine at The Alfred and Monash University, on publication of her article in 2014 which demonstrated both clinical and laboratory evidence of a link between topical application of cosmetics and the development of food allergy to goat's milk.

Review publication: Measuring brain stimulation induced changes in cortical properties using TMS-EEG

TMS plus EEG equals more insight into
effects of brain stmulation

Neuromodulatory brain stimulation can induce plastic reorganization of cortical circuits that persist beyond the period of stimulation. Most of our current knowledge about the physiological properties has been derived from the motor cortex. The integration of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) and electroencephalography (EEG) is a valuable method for directly probing excitability, connectivity and oscillatory dynamics of regions throughout the brain. Offering in depth measurement of cortical reactivity, TMS-EEG allows the evaluation of TMS-evoked components that may act as a marker for cortical excitation and inhibition.

AMSI internships - industry placements for postgraduate students

Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute (AMSI) Intern is a national based program working with industry, recognising a growing need for high-level postgraduates to enter all industry sectors.

The AMSI Internship program allows students to transfer their skills from theory to real world application, while companies gain a competitive advantage by accessing high-quality research expertise.

Very successful R U OK day for CCS/SPHPM morning tea

A very well attended morning tea for #monashruokday was held at Central Clinical School and the School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine on Thursday 10 September 2015. Approximately 100 people attended with Dr Rebecca Segrave from Monash Alfred Psychiatry research centre #MAPrc presenting a general talk on mental health and helping colleagues in the work place. The raffle prizes were a hit, so a special thank you to all our supporting companies who sponsored prizes for the morning tea:

•  Jetts Fitness St Kilda
  • JBF Physical Fitness
  • Letizia Catering Service
  • Yoga & Meditation School of India
  • Starc Rendering Group
  • HealthSmart Pharmacy (Alfred)

Odd spot: Ben Goldacre, author of 'Bad Science', on randomisation

Cartoon: xkcd comic

“Randomisation is not a new idea. It was first proposed in the seventeenth century by John Baptista van Helmont, a Belgian radical who challenged the academics of his day to test their treatments like blood-letting and purging (based on ‘theory’) against his own, which he said were based more on clinical experience: ‘Let us take out of the hospitals, out of the Camps, or from elsewhere, two hundred, or five hundred poor People, that have Fevers, Pleurisies, etc. Let us divide them into half, let us cast lots, that one half of them may fall to my share, and the other to yours … We shall see how many funerals both of us shall have.” 
― Ben Goldacre, Bad Science