PUBLIC RELEASE DATE:

30-Apr-2014

Contact: Ron Najman ron.najman@downstate.edu 718-270-2696 SUNY Downstate Medical Center

A team of researchers from SUNY Downstate Medical Center (SUNY Downstate) and Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute (Sanford-Burnham) has found that deficiencies in hyaluronan, also known as hyaluronic acid or HA, can lead to spontaneous epileptic seizures. HA is a polysaccharide molecule widely distributed throughout connective, epithelial, and neural tissues, including the brain's extracellular space (ECS). Their findings, published on April 30 in The Journal of Neuroscience, equip scientists with key information that may lead to new therapeutic approaches to epilepsy.

The multicenter study used mice to provide the first evidence of a physiological role for HA in the maintenance of brain ECS volume. It also suggests a potential role in human epilepsy for HA and genes that are involved in hyaluronan synthesis and degradation.

While epilepsy is one of the most common neurological disordersaffecting approximately one percent of the population worldwideit is one of the least understood. It is characterized by recurrent spontaneous seizures caused by the abnormal firing of neurons. Although epilepsy treatment is available and effective for about 70 percent of cases, a substantial number of patients could benefit from a new therapeutic approach.

"Hyaluronan is widely known as a key structural component of cartilage and important for maintaining healthy cartilage. Curiously, it has been recognized that the adult brain also contains a lot of hyaluronan, but little is known about what hyaluronan does in the brain," said Yu Yamaguchi, MD, PhD, professor in the Human Genetics Program at Sanford-Burnham.

"This is the first study that demonstrates the important role of this unique molecule for normal functioning of the brain, and that its deficiency may be a cause of epileptic disorders. A better understanding of how hyaluronan regulates brain function could lead to new treatment approaches for epilepsy," Yamaguchi added.

The extracellular matrix of the brain has a unique molecular composition. Earlier studies focused on the role of matrix molecules in cell adhesion and axon pathfinding during neural development. In recent years, increasing attention has been focused on the roles of these molecules in the regulation of physiological functions in the adult brain.

In this study, the investigators examined the role of HA using mutant mice deficient in each of the three hyaluronan synthase genes (Has1, Has2, Has3).

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Researchers reveal new cause of epilepsy

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IU president to visit med school site Tuesday

Following is a list of some of the medical research grants awarded to scientists in the area.

WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE

The scientist Azad Bonni, M.D., Edison Professor of Neurobiology.

Two grants Totalling $3.6 million from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.

The study Looking at factors that regulate the development of brain cells and their branches.

The scientist Laura J. Bierut, M.D., the Alumni Endowed Professor of Psychiatry.

The grant $2.8 million from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

The study Nicotine dependence to smoking cessation: Sequencing common to rare variants.

The scientist Linda J. Sandell, Ph.D., the Mildred B. Simon Research Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery and professor of cell biology and physiology.

The grant $2.7 million from the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases.

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In the lab: Research roundup

Harvards smallest school, the School of Dental Medicine, aims to raise $8 million in the Universitys capital campaign, the School announced at its campaign launch at the Harvard Club of Boston last Thursday.

The Schools goal represents about .001 percent of the University-wide goal of raising a record-breaking $6.5 billion by 2018. The University launched its campaign last September, following a three-year quiet phase of selecting priorities and gauging donor interest.

Wanda Mock, the Assistant Dean for Development and Alumni Relations at the Dental School, said that the Dental Schools involvement in the larger University-wide campaign helps to draw more awareness to [our] whole campaign than if we were just to have a campaign on our own.

According to the Dental Schools website, its campaign funds will be distributed across two priorities: $6 million toward boosting financial assistance for student scholarships and fellowships and $2 million toward supporting local and global public oral health programs.

We want to attract the best and the brightest students, but we dont have the funds to be able to offer many of them a competitive financial aid package, Mock said. Because of their debt burden many of our students are unable to follow their passion.

More than 75 percent of Harvard dental students per year typically receive financial assistance through a combination of federal, private, and school funding. Tuition at the school is currently $54,200 per year, but total costs can rise as high as $100,000, according to the Schools website.

On its campaign webpage, the School has listed a set of requirements for prospective donors. To establish a named, endowed scholarship or fellowship, a donor must contribute a minimum of $250,000, while a named laboratory requires a donation of $500,000. The website also lists required donation levels to create named professorships, named spaces in the schools Research and Education Building, and an endowed fund for dental students.

Many other schools at Harvard, including the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, the Business School, and the Divinity School, have also launched their campaigns. The Medical School and Kennedy School of Government still have yet to launch a campaign.

Staff writer Steven H. Tenzer can be reached at stenzer@college.harvard.edu.

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Dental School Aims To Raise $8 Million in Capital Campaign

MANOA, OAHU (HawaiiNewsNow) -

University of Hawaii-Manoa Chancellor Tom Apple is proposing to eliminate six to eight mostly-vacant dean and director positions and consolidate departments to save more than $1 million a year.

Under the preliminary proposal, the UH's School of Travel Industry Management, founded in 1966, would be merged into its next door neighbor on the Manoa campus, the Shidler College of Business.

The travel industry dean's position is vacant, after the UH Board of Regents balked at a $250,000 salary for a new candidate.

Apple wants to have the business dean oversee both departments and use that money to hire more faculty or lower tuition.

"What I'd like to do is try to find a way to consolidate units more so that we have fewer of those executive managerial salaries," Apple said. "And that the people who are running various organizations are from within, people who are already on our payroll."

Students at the travel industry school Hawaii News Now spoke to at midday Tuesday had varying opinions on the idea.

"I really like being separate because it is a different entity," said Christian Gutierrez, a junior travel industry management major from Austin, Texas. "It's a different type. It's hospitality. You're more of a people person instead of just with numbers and just with business."

Chris Almendar, a senior travel industry management major from Santa Barbara, Calif., liked the idea of a merger.

"When there's so many courses that overlap and so many instructor and we're so close already. I don't see why they don't just merge them," Almendar said.

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Manoa chancellor proposes eliminating exec. jobs, saving $1M+ a year

Bangalore, April 28:

Indian Institute of Management Bangalores (IIM-B) alumni meet Anusmaran will be held on May 4 at the IIM-B campus in Bangalore. This years meet, spread across 15 cities around the world, is likely to see the participation of over 8,000 IIM-B alumni.

The Bangalore Chapter will host three panel discussions on Entrepreneurship and Disruptive Thinking on the IIM-B campus as part of the event.

The other IIM-B chapters where panel discussions and entrepreneurship is the theme are: Chennai Chapter (May 3); USA East Coast Chapter (May 17), where Ashish Pandey (PGP02), CEO, Altisource Residential Corporation, will address the alumni; Kolkata Chapter (May 10), where C S Ghosh, Chairman & MD, Bandhan Group, will speak.

Rakesh Godhwani, Head Alumni and Development IIM-B, said Anusmaran is a perfect example of how we can leverage the gold mine of knowledge that the alumni of IIMB possess. Learning from each other is undoubtedly our way forward.

Harish Mittal, President of IIMBAA Bangalore Chapter, Founder and Managing Director at Camellia Clothing Ltd, said Bangalore is the new haven for entrepreneurs and we have seen tremendous energy among IIMB alumni in the city to learn from one anothers entrepreneurial experience.

For the Bangalore Chapter event panellists on the Start Up Track include Saumil Majumdar (PGP95), Co-Founder & Managing Director of EduSports; Manu Indrayan (PGP94), Founder of 612 Ivy League; Sanjay Anandaram, (PGP91), Entrepreneur, Investor, Advisor and Mentor, Ojas Venture and Founding Partner of JumpStart; K Ganesh (IIMC),Chairman and Co-Founder Portea Medical; Meena Ganesh (IIMC), CEO & Managing Director, Portea Medical; and P C Musthafa (IIMB PGSEM07) Co-Founder, ID Fresh Food.

Panelists on Join the Entrepreneur include Subhash Dhar (PGP92), CEO, Enterprise Nube Services; Atul Shinghal (PGP93), CEO Probe Equity Research; Sudhakar Varanasi (IIT KGP and PhD IISc), Chief Mentor, Emergent Institute; Anju Maudgal Kadam (IIMB MPWE 2010), Founder and Director Web TV.in; and Professor Ramya Ranganathan (IITM & IIMA and PhD London School Of Business), IIMB faculty.

Panelists on Social Change Agents include A Vaidyanathan (PGP83), Founder & Managing Director, Cleantech Consultants and HMX Systems; Mainak Chakraborty (PGP10), Co-CEO, Green Power Systems; Poonam Bir Kasturi (NID Ahmedabad 86), Industrial Designer, Facilitator, Entrepreneur and Mentor at Founder Industree Crafts and Playnspeak and Pioneer of the Daily Dump Project; Shridhar Venkat (NMIMS), Executive Director, Akshaya Patra Foundation; Ramesh Swamy (REC Bhopal), CEO, Swamy Group of Companies; and Suresh Bhagavatula (PhD Netherlands), Assistant Professor, NSRCEL at IIMB.

(This article was published on April 28, 2014)

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IIM-B alumni meet to be held in 15 cities

Apr. 27, 2014 @ 08:27 AM

HUNTINGTON Sixteen Marshall alumni and one club were honored at the Marshall University Alumni Associations 77th annual Alumni Awards Banquet on Saturday in the Memorial Student Centers Don Morris Room on Marshall Universitys Huntington campus.

The banquet capped Marshalls 2014 Alumni Weekend, scheduled to coincide with the annual Green and White Game.

Following is a list of the award winners honored at this years banquet:

National awards

Distinguished Alumnus Award: Dr. Eric R. George

George is a hand surgeon practicing medicine in Louisiana. A native of Huntington and a graduate of Huntington East High School, he received his medical degree from Marshall. His practice, the Hand Center of Louisiana, treats NFL players and key players in the oil and gas industries, among other businesses, and is the largest in the Gulf South region. He owns a luxury hospital, the Omega Hospital, and several ambulatory surgery centers, urgent care clinics and assisted living centers.

Alumnus Community Achievement Award: Karen Williams

Williams is a native of Charlestons west side. She attended Glenwood Elementary, Woodrow Wilson Junior High and Stonewall Jackson High School. She has been the national and state chairwoman of the Association for Developmental Education, on the board and an active member of Kanawha County International Reading Association, on the Board of Directors and a clinician of the Literacy Volunteers of Kanawha County, charter member of the Charleston District Outreach Ministries Tutor Training, a member of the National Dropout Prevention Network and the Kanawha County Literacy Coalition.

Distinguished Service Award: Charles C. Lanham

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Banquet honors individual alumni, club

Quick links to other pages on this site | Still can't find it? see Site Index Brad Nettles/StaffAn 1880 photograph shows students at Porter Military Academy. The school is holding their 50th reunion of the last class to graduate. Buy this photo

The third weekend of every April, alumni of Porter Military Academy gather at St. Luke's Chapel for a service to celebrate the heritage and history of their school.

This year that annual tradition will take on a deeper meaning as members of the class of 1964 - the last graduating class of the academy - will gather for their first reunion in 50 years.

"We had some good times," said Mike Ratcliffe, a 1964 graduate of the academy who has helped organize the reunion.

Despite the academy's name, Ratcliffe said it was military only in appearance but not in curriculum. The boys wore military-style uniforms and marched each morning to St. Luke's Chapel for service, but there were no military classes.

The academy has a complex history that dates to 1867 when the Rev. Anthony Toomer Porter, an Episcopal priest, formed the Holy Communion Church Institute as a school and orphanage for children orphaned during the Civil War. In 1880, the school located at an old military arsenal near the present day intersection of Ashley Avenue and Bee Street.

The school was eventually renamed Porter Military Academy and functioned as an all boys boarding school until 1954. It continued to operate as a private school for grades 1-12 until 1964 when the campus was sold to the Medical University of South Carolina.

That same year school officials decided to merge Porter Military Academy with the Gaud School for Boys, founded in 1908, and the Watt School, founded in 1931. The new school, called Porter-Gaud School, opened in the fall of 1964. The school moved a year later to its current location on Albemarle Road following a donation of 70 acres from Atlantic Coast Line Railroad.

Today all but three of the buildings on the academy's campus have been demolished. Only St. Luke's Chapel, Colcock Hall and the Waring Historical Library remain.

The history of the school was palpable to the students who went there. Ratcliffe recalled discovering old tunnels under the arsenal.

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Porter Military Academy celebrates 50th reunion of last graduating class

ColumbiaDoctors, the multi-specialty medical practice comprised of more than 1,200 faculty of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, College of Dental Medicine and School of Nursing, recently became one of the largest medical practices in Westchester with its acquisition of North Star Medical Group.

Many of the top doctors in Westchester are P&S alumni and already have strong relationships with us. Integrating these practices with ColumbiaDoctors improves the experience for patients, especially when they need care by multiple specialists, said Dr. Lee Goldman,dean of the Faculties of Health Sciences and Medicine at CUMC.

Nine offices specializing in family medicine, internal medicine, gastroenterology and pulmonary medicine join Columbias existing network throughout the New York metropolitan area.

The northward expansion represents the latest phase in the growth of the faculty practice. New offices on West 51st Street near Rockefeller Center in Manhattan opened in 2013, adding about 25 percent greater capacity than the former location on Manhattans East Side. ColumbiaDoctors Midtown now sees more than 1,000 patients a day, offering X-rays and other imaging, laboratory services, primary care and several other specialties.

For more information on the faculty practice, visit columbiadoctors.org.

by CUMC News

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ColumbiaDoctors Expands Into Westchester County

Campus News By SUE WUETCHER

The late Ralph Wilson Jr., founder and 54-year owner of the Buffalo Bills, will be honored with the Chancellor Charles P. Norton Medal, UBs highest award, during the universitys168th general commencement on May 18.

Nancy H. Nielsen, senior associate dean for health policy, UB School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, and Robert Gioia, president of The John R. Oishei Foundation and chair of the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corporation, will receive the UB Presidents Medal in recognition of extraordinary service to the university.

Also during the ceremony, SUNY honorary doctorates will be presented to UB alumnus Ira Flatow, host of Public Radio Internationals Science Friday; Jack Lightstone, president and vice chancellor of Brock University in St. Catharines; and UB alumnus Norman McCombs, recipient of the 2013 National Medal of Technology and Innovation.

The Chancellor Charles P. Norton Medal is presented annually in public recognition of a person who has, in Nortons words, performed some great thing which is identified with Buffalo a great civic or political act, a great book, a great work of art, a great scientific achievement or any other thing which, in itself, is truly great and ennobling, and which dignifies the performer and Buffalo in the eyes of the world.

Throughout his distinguished career, Ralph Wilson Jr. had a profound impact regionally and nationally. A founding member of the American Football League, he established the Buffalo Bills franchise in 1959, the only team to remain in its originating city. Recognized by The Buffalo News as the regions top sports figure of the 20th century, Wilson was inducted in 2009 into the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the highest honor in the NFL.

A pioneering proponent of youth football nationally, he was a vital supporter of numerous community organizations, including the food banks of Buffalo and Rochester, the United Way of Buffalo and Erie County, Sheas Performing Arts Center, and the Buffalo Zoo. With his wife, Mary, he was a leading supporter of many regional health institutions, including the Hospice Foundation of Western New York, the Cancer Wellness Center, Hunters Hope and the Kaleida Health Foundation.

Through the Ralph Wilson Medical Research Foundation and the Ralph C. Wilson Foundation, he provided significant support to Roswell Park Cancer Institute, the Cleveland Clinic and the Mayo Clinic, and established the Buffalo Bills Team Physicians Fund to support UBs Department of Sports Medicine. Wilson also established major scholarship programs at Canisius College, SUNY Fredonia, St. John Fisher College and the University of Virginia.

A World War II Navy veteran who served in both the Atlantic and Pacific theaters, Wilson has been awarded numerous national and regional honors for his philanthropy, patriotism, and civic and sports leadership, including the NFL Alumni Order of the Leather Helmet, the National World War II Museums American Spirit Award and the Sovereign Grand Commanders Medal of Honor by the Masons. Wilson passed away in March at the age of 95.

The UB Presidents Medal, first presented in 1990, recognizes outstanding scholarly or artistic achievements, humanitarian acts, contributions of time or treasure, exemplary leadership or any other major contribution to the development of the University at Buffalo and the quality of life in the UB community.

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Wilson to posthumously receive Norton medal