[Bioundgrd] Fwd: 2003-2004 EMBS-BMES Distinguished Lecture Series

[Janice Chang]

>
>Dear colleagues and friends,
>
>The Boston chapter of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
>         (IEEE)-Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBS)
>                                  &
>               the MIT Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES)
>                           proudly present:
>
>        *** The 2003-2004 EMBS-BMES Distinguished Lecture Series ***
>
>We invite you to join us for our new monthly lecture series in which 
>we explore
>recent developments and stimulating topics in the expanding field of 
>biomedical
>engineering.  In the fall, speakers from both academia and industry 
>will introduce such
>subjects as genes, genomics, proteomics, and systems biology.
>
>Our second lecture will be:
>
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>Dissecting Complex Diseases: Genomic Instability and Schizophrenia in Twins
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
>Cassandra Smith, Ph.D.
>Professor, Biomedical Engineering
>Professor, Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics
>School of Medicine, Boston University
>
>Wednesday, November 19th, 2003
>7PM (Refreshments at 6:30PM)
>MIT Building 66, 77 Massachusetts Ave., Room 66-110
>	(For directions to MIT, please visit http://whereis.mit.edu)
>
>* This event is free and open to the public.*
>
>************************************************************************
>
>ABSTRACT:
>
>Schizophrenia afflicts 1% of the population worldwide and, like many 
>complex diseases, has genetic and environmental components that are 
>difficult to dissect.  Some monozygotic (a.k.a identical) twins that 
>inherit the same DNA are discordant for Schizophrenia.  Further, all 
>the progeny of twin-pairs discordant for schizophrenia have a 10% 
>probability of being afflicted by this disease.  Thus, the avoidance 
>(or minimization) of schizophrenia in a susceptible parent did not 
>prevent the parent from passing the genetic predisposition to 
>his/her progeny.  The goal of this research is to understand how the 
>well-twin avoided schizophrenia.
>
>Several lines of research suggest the presentation of this disease 
>is related to DNA changes and our research is focused on identifying 
>these changes even though the $1000  total genome analysis is not 
>available. This research developed an efficient comparative genomics 
>method, called targeted genomic differential display (TGDD) that 
>revealed the presence of a larger than expected number of 
>differences inc monozygotic twins around (CAG)n repeating sequences. 
>In addition, an explanation was sought for the linkage of 
>schizophrenia in different families to variable genes and 
>chromosomal abnormalities spread throughout the genome. The results 
>revealed the affected regions contained DNA sequences that are known 
>to be unstable.  The results from these studies suggest that 
>schizophrenia is associated with a global DNA instability, and that 
>prevention of this disease is through stabilizing the genome.
>
>
>SPEAKER BACKGROUND:
>
>Professor Smith is a Professor of Biomedical Engineering and 
>Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics in the School of Medicine 
>at Boston University.  Her research is focused on developing and 
>applying novel molecular methods to aid identification, functional 
>analysis and treatment of disease.  A central theme to this work is 
>the sequence-specific manipulation of DNA molecules by such methods 
>as enzyme-assisted hybridization, sequence-based DNA capture and 
>purification techniques, and novel methods for DNA amplification. 
>Professor Smith received her Ph.D. in Genetics from Texas A&M 
>University.
>
>************************************************************************
>
>If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us.  We look
>forward to seeing you!
>
>
>Best Regards,
>
>Mandy Yeung					Alexis DeSieno
>VP of Special Programs			President
>BMES,MIT Chapter				BMES, MIT Chapter
>mandyy at mit.edu				alexisd at mit.edu