MRC PhD student
Level of study: PostDoc
Title: The Nurturing and Consolidation of the Brain and Behaviour Neuroscience Research Inititative in the Western Cape
Brief description of the project
In 2005/6, the University of Cape Town called for proposals for Research Signature Themes which would enjoy priority executive and financial support from the University. Out of 24 applications two were considered good enough to meet the high standards which the international review panel demanded. One of these was a Brain and Behaviour Initiative (BBI) which proposed to draw researchers from a broad spectrum of disciplines to create a critical mass of interdisciplinary capacity in the neuro-behavioural sciences to serve as a platform for vigorous collaborative research activity. Since its inception the BBI has made definite progress towards its goal and has expanded to the Cross-University Brain Behaviour Initiative with Stellenbosch University. Numerous new projects and collaborations have been conceived and initiated and new equipment has been installed. The latter include a research-dedicated state-of-the-art 3 Tesla MRI scanner located in the new Combined University Brain Imaging Centre (CUBIC) at Tygerberg Campus.
Certain individuals and groups have made crucial contributions to the success of the BBI. One of these is the MRC/UCT Medical Imaging Research Unit (MIRU) which under the Directorship of Professor Kit Vaughan has provided the technical know-how needed to operate the new equipment, especially the MRI scanner. Dr Barak Morgan is a researcher in MIRU with a MBBCh (with 5 years experience in psychiatry) and a PhD in engineering. This dual-discipline background places him at the interface between man and machine. He is also the only medically qualified person in MIRU.
Urbach-Wiethe Disease (UWD) is a rare genetic syndrome causing selective bilateral amygdala degeneration and ~50 individuals in the rural Northern Cape province of South Africa constitute >90% of UWD cases worldwide. Such specific damage to the core of the emotional brain is so scientifically valuable that a single UWD case in the USA has provided several Nature publications. The SA UWD population therefore offers the unique and exciting opportunity to study this syndrome in a group that is large enough to yield statistically significant results.
The first phase of a multidisciplinary investigation into the South African UWD population occurred in May 2007 lead by Dr Morgan and his close collaborator Professor Jack van Honk of Utrecht University, Netherlands. They were supported by several teams of basic and clinical researchers from Cape Town, Wits and Stellenbosch universities.
Specific aims of the project
Single-case UWD studies indicate severe social-emotional deficits yet our preliminary observations in 40 South African subjects suggested largely intact social-emotional function. We therefore hypothesized that in UWD NURTURE compensates for NATURE via neuroplasticity. In the largest and best-controlled UWD study ever undertaken, we brought 20 people (7 UWD subjects and 13 age-, education-, sex- and demography- matched normal controls) from the Northern Cape to the new 3T MRI scanner at Tygerberg Hospital. Here we administered cutting-edge behavioural social-emotional experimental paradigms and gathered structural MRI (sMRI), electroencephalographic (EEG) data to test this hypothesis. In addition the subjects all had full neuropsychological, neurological (including a sleep EEG), psychiatric and genetic (including counselling) assessments.
Supervisor: Prof Kit Vaughan
MRC Unit: Medical Imaging Research Unit
Study Institution: University of Cape Town |
