German collaboration to further neuroscience

Professor Simon Brookes has obtained research funding through the 2018 Australia-Germany Joint Cooperation Scheme, that will involve academics at Flinders and in Germany working together to study a novel type of muscle sensory neuron over the next two years.

A joint initiative of Universities Australia and the German Academic Exchange Services, the scheme aims to foster research collaboration between Australia and Germany.

Professor Simon Brookes is Professor of Human Physiology in the College of Medicine and Public Health. The shared research on Thermosensitive responses in striated muscle sensory neurons will aim for detailed identification of the molecular basis of thermal responses in muscular afferents.

Rochelle Peterson, a Flinders PhD student, will go to the laboratory of Professor Katharina Zimmermann (at Friedrich-Alexander Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg) to investigate temperature dependence of “CT3” muscle sensory neuron responses. This study into how temperature is encoded by sensory neurons that innervate skeletal muscle will help provide a composite picture of muscle activity to the central nervous system.

German researchers visiting Flinders will learn tracing techniques to further identify how temperature modulates other classes of muscle sensory neurons, including muscle spindles and muscle nociceptors.

The facilities in Germany and at Flinders each have specific assets that will benefit visiting researchers. Flinders has developed a unique set of tools that allow the morphology of sensory endings, including their transduction sites, to be established and linked to their functional properties. These techniques have been applied to the gut and bladder, but also work in somatic structures, including skeletal muscle. The laboratory also has extensive experience with neuronal tracing combined with multiple labelling immunohistochemistry.

The laboratory at Erlangen has world-leading expertise in thermoreception by sensory neurons. It has extensive experience with extracellular afferents from skin-nerve preparations, and various other organ-nerve preparations, genomics and optical imaging facilities.

The shared use of these facilities will enable highly detailed studies to identify morphologically of sensory endings, addressing a significant neuroscience issue.

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