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2023-2024 in Review

Updated: Aug 13

We're now just over halfway through 2024, and we have had a very eventful year and a half since moving to QBI, so here is a recap!


Moving the Lab to QBI and a new start at ANU


The start of 2023 saw some big changes for the Dehorter Lab; we moved to the Queensland Brain Institute. This was such an exciting time for us! We had Ilvana start as our lab manager, and Nab commence as a PhD student.


The QBI building; Nathalie, Becky, Ilvana, and Noorya in the new QBI lab.


With most of the lab moving to Brisbane, Shaam remained to hold down the fort at ANU, with some exciting new collaborations. Elise and Anna continued in the lab, working on new projects, and Sara started as a research student.

Since then, we have also welcomed William in March 2024 as a new postdoc at QBI.

Coming from Paris, France, Eden did a very successful three-month internship with us, and recently finished up! Congratulations Eden!

And we have more new students at QBI, Hiral and Yuanlu! Hiral will be doing a research project before starting Honours next year, and Yuanlu has just started her Honours research year.

We also have Ollie starting his Honours with Shaam at ANU!


Top left: Anna is currently completing her honours year at ANU in Canberra; top right: Elise is a medical student at ANU, currently working on a project in the lab in Canberra; middle: William Kwan is a new postdoc at QBI; bottom left: dinner for Eden's last day in the lab! Bottom right: Hiral and Yuanlu have started as new undergraduate students at QBI.


Conferences Galore

We went to many conferences in 2023 and 2024, showcasing some of our work both locally and internationally.

2023:

  • IBAGS: Nathalie, Becky, and Noorya attended the International Basal Ganglia Society Meeting in Stockholm, Sweden. Nathalie gave an amazing talk, and Becky and Noorya presented posters. You can see some more details of that trip in our first blog post.

  • WPC: Becky attended the World Parkinson's Congress in Barcelona, Spain, and presented a poster on her work! She met so many researchers working on Parkinson's Disease research, from all over the world! Even the opening ceremony was amazing, check it out here!

  • EMBO Workshop: In September, Nathalie attended the Gene Regulatory Mechanisms in Neural Fate Decisions EMBO Workshop in Alicante, Spain. She gave a brilliant short talk on "Etv1-dependent Transcriptional Control of Neural Progenitor Cell proliferation and Specification".

  • Space & Number in Animal Minds: Also in September, Shaam presented at a local workshop at ANU, giving a talk on "Space and Time in Memory: A Window Upon Novel Therapeutics?".

  • CADD: In November, Nathalie and Noorya presented at the Scientific Meeting of the ASBMB Cell Architecture Special Interest Group, which was held locally at QBI in Brisbane. Nathalie gave an invited talk on "Monitoring the Monitors: Molecular Control of the Developing Interneurons in Health and Disease", and Noorya presented a selected short talk on "Shifting sex-specific serotonergic neuron circuitry in the Dorsal Raphe Nucleus".

  • CAMAND: The Cellular and Molecular Advances in Neurodegeneration Conference had its inaugural meeting in Brisbane as a satellite of ANS. Nathalie, Becky, and Nab attended, with Nab presenting a poster, and Becky giving a brilliant talk titled "Examining the Neuro-Immune Interactions to Trace the Origin and Progression of Parkinson's Disease".

  • ANS: The Dehorter Lab had a very successful time at the Australian Neuroscience Society Anuual Meeting, which was held in Brisbane this year. Nathalie chaired a special ANS Developmental Neuroscience Symposium on the Development of cortical neurons and networks. Shaam presented a talk in a symposium of mechanisms of experience-dependent plasticity titled "H2A.B: A new epigenetic player that controls the consolidation of long-term memory". And Becky was selected for an oral presentation on "Alpha Synuclein and Immune Interactions in Parkinson's Disease Ontogenesis". Excellent job all!

Shaam (left) and Becky (middle) presenting at ANS 2023, and enjoying the beautiful view of the Brisbane River (right).


2024: (so far!)

  • INSAR: The International Society for Autism Research Annual Meeting was held in Melbourne, Australia in May this year; Nathalie and Shaam attended, with Shaam giving an oral presentation on how "Parvalbumin Interneuron Activity in Autism Underlies Vulnerability to PTSD-like Memory Formation".

  • GRC: Noorya attended the Molecular and Cellular Neurobiology Gordon Research Seminar and Conference in Tuscany, Italy in May/June. She presented a poster on "Sexual Dimorphism in Serotonergic Circuitry Underlying Specific Anxiety-Related Behaviour", and was awarded a best poster award.

  • FENS: Nathalie and Shaam attended the 2024 Federation of European Neuroscience Societies Forum which was in Vienna, Austria. Both presented excellent posters; Nathalie on Parkinson's Disease research, and Shaam on developing a developmental treatment for Autism Spectrum Disorder.

  • CNNE: The SUSTech-UQ Joint Centre for Neuroscience and Neural Engineering had its inaugural symposium in Brisbane. Noorya gave a talk on sex differences in serotonergic circuitry that contribute to anxiety-related behavioural states.

Noorya's view at the GRC in Tuscany, Italy (left), and Shaam presenting at FENS (right).


Brain Teaser 2023

Brain Teaser is the annual outreach event for National Science Week that was started in 2021 by PhD students in the Dehorter Lab (Noorya and Nathan). 2023 was its third year, with Noorya and Becky on the organising committee and Shaam hosting a booth at the event. It was an amazing event, with plenty of people interacting with the booths and learning all about neuroscience! We also had Alan Finkel, the former chief scientist of Australia, and the founder of Axon Instruments, joining us to give a talk, which was very exciting! Congratulations to all of the PhD students and postdocs organising the event, and to all of the excellent speakers and booth presenters!


Brain Teaser 2023: Becky and the team handing out goodie bags (top left), Shaam at her booth on Memory (top right & bottom left), Alan Finkel presenting (bottom right).




Visitor tours

We did a number of tours in 2023 and 2024 at QBI! The Hamilton Probus Club visited us to learn more about our research (pictured right), and Becky led an excellent tour showcasing our work on Parkinson's Disease. We were also visited by the Ben and Werona Armstrong, and Nathalie and Noorya presented our work on Autism Spectrum Disorder. We would like to thank all our supporters for their time and donations!



QBI Pub 2023

The Dehorter Lab put on an amazing QBI Pub in October 2023! We had a really fun Halloween theme and made some brillian biscuits, cupcakes, and even a pumpkin spewing guacamole! Everyone had a brilliant time together and enjoyed getting into the spooky spirit of it all!


Left to Right: A pumpkin spewing nachos was the star of the Dehorter Lab QBI Pub; Ilvana, Noorya, Nathalie, Becky, and Nab with some spooky accessories on; Halloween themed cupcakes and biscuits for QBI to enjoy!


Graduations!

Nathan, Rhys, and Noorya all completed their PhDs in 2023 and graduated at the end of the year together. They are the first PhD graduates from the Dehorter Lab! They all started short projects with Nathalie in 2017, followed by Honours (Rhys 2019 and Noorya 2018) and Masters (Nathan 2018) research years, before starting their PhDs. Nathan has joined the Natoli Lab at JCSMR as a postdoc, Noorya has moved to QBI with the Dehorter Lab as a postdoc, and Rhys Knowles is in medical school at ANU. Here are some of their better moments:

Top left: Noorya and Rhys after their 3-minute thesis at CHARM; top right: Nathan and Noorya during Brain Teaser 2021; middle left to right: Rhys, Noorya, and Nathan in the lab; Nathan after submitting his thesis! Nathan, Noorya and Rhys at JCSMR in their fourth year; Shaam, Noorya, Nathalie, and Rhys at Graduation; bottom left: Angela Nicoli, JCSMR Director Graham Mann, Brian Billups, Nathan Reynolds, Nathalie Dehorter, Rhys Knowles, and Noorya Ahmed at the 2023 ANU Graduation Ceremony; bottom right: Nathan, Nathalie, Rhys, and Noorya.

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