- Email: [email protected]
From our Oceanic correspondent
VI
TINS - March 1980
From our Oceanic correspondent lization and consequent gain in critical
S~trting this month TINS will provide occasional coverage of developments in the neurosciences taking place in Australia and South-East Asia. Here Laurie Geffen kicks off with an overview of the 'Aussie' scene.
mass.
Last month the Australian Neurosciences Society held a three-day meeting in Canberra that included symposia on neurobiology, biochemical and clinical aspects of myelination, control of movement in man and monkeys, and behavioural regulation of feeding and drinking. The Experimental Psychology Conference will meet from 16 to 18 May at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. (Accounts of these meetings and the politics behind them will appear in future columns.) In 1981, in an attempt to attract a wide spectrum of neuroscientists to the Australian Neurosciences Society, the Centre for Neuroscience at the blinders University of South Australia is organizing a three-day conference from 27 to 30 January, comprising several symposia of general interest offering posters and free communication sessions. Topics include transmitters and their receptors; central control of blood pressure; cerebral asymmetries; pain; and developmental " neurobiology. Consideration will be given to clinical as well as basic aspects of these subjects. There will also be poster and free communication sessions and offers of papers from neuroscientists throughout the world and especially from Oceania and South-East Asia would be welcomed. Finally, and still on the Australian scene, there is intense speculation about future developments in the Physiology Department at Monash University in Melbourne. Under the leadership first of Archie McIntyre and then Bob Porter, it became the largest and leading neurophysiology department in the country during the late 1960s. McIntyre retired recently and now Porter has had the distinction of being appointed to the Directorship of the John Curtin School. The only remaining Professor in Mollie Holman who holds a personal Chair. With the growth of strong neurophysiology groups elsewhere, it is possible the focus at Monash may switch to other areas of physiology but whatever the outcome, neuroscience now has, in the person of Bob Porter, a committed and articulate ally in the Canberra corridors of power.
A striking feature of the neurosciences as they enter the 1980s is the extent to which their gatherings have expanded into a hectic summer round of specialist conferences located mainly in Europe together with the enlarging annual forums of the American and European Neurosciences Societies. As fuel prices and hence air fares rise and travel grants shrivel, neuroscientists in the Antipodes and South-East Asia find themselves increasingly isolated from regular participation in these arenas and are looking for local outlets. In this occasional column, I hope to inform you of neuroscience activities in the region and of the personalities and politics behind them - a worm's-eye view from down under as it were! In Australia, the various neuroscience disciplines are struggling to find a corporate identity while remaining loyal 'as individuals to the established societies such as the Australian Physiological and Pharmacological Society, the Australian Psychological Society, and the Australian Biochemical Society. An Australian Neuroscience Society, informally presided over by Lawrie Austin, Biochemistry Department, Monash University, has been in existence for several years, but its activities have been confined to an annual one-day symposium, arranged on an informal basis. At the 1979 meeting at Hinders University in Adelaide, those seeking a more formal structure for the Society prevailed over those who were comfortable with a low-key, loose association. Now a national executive has been elected consisting of a President (Lawrie Austin, Biochemistry Department, Monash University), Secretary (Ian Chubb, Physiology Department, Hinders University) and Treasurer (Ian Hendry, Pharmacology Department, Australian National University) together with representatives from each of the six affiliated states, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and
Western Australia. The total membership of the Society is uncertain as there were no fees previously, but there are 240 scientists on its mailing list. The National Executive, which is entirely composed of basic scientists needs to make a concerted effort to attract more clinicians to the Australian Neurosciences Society. Another potential source of great strength is the experimental psychologists who, for several years, have participated in an equally loosely structured group, the Experimental Psychology Conference (sired by Don McNicol of the University of New South Wales and god-fathered by Ross Day of Monash University) that has also been meeting since the early 1970s with over 100 adherents from a wide variety of disciplines beyond traditional psychology. Dialogue between experimental psychologists and other neuroscientists appears to be an increasing feature of the European and American Neuroscience Societies and is tlae subject of much debate in the columns of T I N S . However, in Australia there has been insufficient intercourse between the two groups to warrant a shotgun wedding which is a pity since (to press the metaphor) both groups could benefit from the interdisciplinary ferti-
... .......... ...% ................
LAURIE GEFFEN
~
"
:...',.:;:':
Laurie Geffen is Professor of Human Physiology at the Centre for Neuroscience, Flinders University of South Australia, Bedford Park, S.A. 5042.
o~
© Elsevier/North-HollandBiomedical Press 1980
/
TINS - March 1980
From our Oceanic correspondent lization and consequent gain in critical
S~trting this month TINS will provide occasional coverage of developments in the neurosciences taking place in Australia and South-East Asia. Here Laurie Geffen kicks off with an overview of the 'Aussie' scene.
mass.
Last month the Australian Neurosciences Society held a three-day meeting in Canberra that included symposia on neurobiology, biochemical and clinical aspects of myelination, control of movement in man and monkeys, and behavioural regulation of feeding and drinking. The Experimental Psychology Conference will meet from 16 to 18 May at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. (Accounts of these meetings and the politics behind them will appear in future columns.) In 1981, in an attempt to attract a wide spectrum of neuroscientists to the Australian Neurosciences Society, the Centre for Neuroscience at the blinders University of South Australia is organizing a three-day conference from 27 to 30 January, comprising several symposia of general interest offering posters and free communication sessions. Topics include transmitters and their receptors; central control of blood pressure; cerebral asymmetries; pain; and developmental " neurobiology. Consideration will be given to clinical as well as basic aspects of these subjects. There will also be poster and free communication sessions and offers of papers from neuroscientists throughout the world and especially from Oceania and South-East Asia would be welcomed. Finally, and still on the Australian scene, there is intense speculation about future developments in the Physiology Department at Monash University in Melbourne. Under the leadership first of Archie McIntyre and then Bob Porter, it became the largest and leading neurophysiology department in the country during the late 1960s. McIntyre retired recently and now Porter has had the distinction of being appointed to the Directorship of the John Curtin School. The only remaining Professor in Mollie Holman who holds a personal Chair. With the growth of strong neurophysiology groups elsewhere, it is possible the focus at Monash may switch to other areas of physiology but whatever the outcome, neuroscience now has, in the person of Bob Porter, a committed and articulate ally in the Canberra corridors of power.
A striking feature of the neurosciences as they enter the 1980s is the extent to which their gatherings have expanded into a hectic summer round of specialist conferences located mainly in Europe together with the enlarging annual forums of the American and European Neurosciences Societies. As fuel prices and hence air fares rise and travel grants shrivel, neuroscientists in the Antipodes and South-East Asia find themselves increasingly isolated from regular participation in these arenas and are looking for local outlets. In this occasional column, I hope to inform you of neuroscience activities in the region and of the personalities and politics behind them - a worm's-eye view from down under as it were! In Australia, the various neuroscience disciplines are struggling to find a corporate identity while remaining loyal 'as individuals to the established societies such as the Australian Physiological and Pharmacological Society, the Australian Psychological Society, and the Australian Biochemical Society. An Australian Neuroscience Society, informally presided over by Lawrie Austin, Biochemistry Department, Monash University, has been in existence for several years, but its activities have been confined to an annual one-day symposium, arranged on an informal basis. At the 1979 meeting at Hinders University in Adelaide, those seeking a more formal structure for the Society prevailed over those who were comfortable with a low-key, loose association. Now a national executive has been elected consisting of a President (Lawrie Austin, Biochemistry Department, Monash University), Secretary (Ian Chubb, Physiology Department, Hinders University) and Treasurer (Ian Hendry, Pharmacology Department, Australian National University) together with representatives from each of the six affiliated states, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and
Western Australia. The total membership of the Society is uncertain as there were no fees previously, but there are 240 scientists on its mailing list. The National Executive, which is entirely composed of basic scientists needs to make a concerted effort to attract more clinicians to the Australian Neurosciences Society. Another potential source of great strength is the experimental psychologists who, for several years, have participated in an equally loosely structured group, the Experimental Psychology Conference (sired by Don McNicol of the University of New South Wales and god-fathered by Ross Day of Monash University) that has also been meeting since the early 1970s with over 100 adherents from a wide variety of disciplines beyond traditional psychology. Dialogue between experimental psychologists and other neuroscientists appears to be an increasing feature of the European and American Neuroscience Societies and is tlae subject of much debate in the columns of T I N S . However, in Australia there has been insufficient intercourse between the two groups to warrant a shotgun wedding which is a pity since (to press the metaphor) both groups could benefit from the interdisciplinary ferti-
... .......... ...% ................
LAURIE GEFFEN
~
"
:...',.:;:':
Laurie Geffen is Professor of Human Physiology at the Centre for Neuroscience, Flinders University of South Australia, Bedford Park, S.A. 5042.
o~
© Elsevier/North-HollandBiomedical Press 1980
/