Brain Research
Through world-class research, we are working to combat brain disorders and reduce their impact on individuals, New Zealand and the world.
Brain Research Projects
Understanding apathy in Huntington’s disease – from cognitive mechanisms to longitudinal trajectories.
Status: In-progress Year: 2021 Funded: $109,870 Grant Type: Major Project Grant
Apathy (loss of motivation) is commonly seen in people with Huntington’s disease (HD), but remains poorly understood. Dr Le Heron’s team will study people with HD in Canterbury using novel behavioural tasks, to determine whether apathy is caused by disruption of normal brain decision-making processes. Furthermore, by combining these insights with analyses of international HD datasets – which researchers and patients in Canterbury have been contributing to for the last eight years – we will deepen understanding of how apathy evolves in relation to other aspects of HD. By doing so, the study will provide new understanding of the mechanisms underlying apathy. This will open two new avenues for improving clinical management. Firstly, it will pave the way for treatments that specifically target apathy itself, thereby improving quality of life for patients. Secondly, the combined mechanistic and trajectory information will provide an important step towards an apathy-based behavioural biomarker, to be used to guide management in clinical settings and as an outcome of trials.
Researcher // Dr Campbell Le Heron – Canterbury District Health Board
Dr Le Heron is a neurologist with a strong interest in cognitive disorders and the normal neural processes that underlie these deficits. He completed my undergraduate medical studies at the University of Otago, and subsequently undertook Neurology advanced training in Melbourne, Australia and a Fellowship in Oxford, UK.
in every 10,000 people has Huntington’s
chance of child born to a parent with HD having the disease
-40 years old at onset of Huntington’s
10-year MRI in Parkinson’s
Status: Complete
Year: 2020
Funded: $109,226
Grant Type: Major Project Grant
Characterising 10-year brain changes associated with cognitive decline in Parkinson’s disease.
Parkinson’s disease is a neurodegenerative movement disorder that affects approximately 12,000 people in New Zealand, and which we project to double by 2040. While motor impairments dominate the early clinical picture, cognitive decline and dementia eventually cause the greatest burden in this progressive disease. While our understanding of the brain changes that drive this irreversible progression towards dementia is improving, there is still much we do not know. We are in a unique position world-wide to further this knowledge. Over the past decade, we have recruited and followed a group of Parkinson’s disease patients with extensive cognitive testing and different types of brain scans. We will now investigate how changes on multiple brain scans over 10 years are associated with cognitive decline and the development of dementia. This work will provide a more complete and nuanced understanding of the relationship between brain health and cognitive ability over time in Parkinson’s disease. In the long term, accurate tracking of brain health could have significant medical, social, and economic implications, by providing confirmation of appropriate treatment interventions to explore, and eventually providing outcome measures in future clinical trials of disease-modifying therapies.
Associate Professor Melzer is involved in a wide range of neurological research, including child development, mild traumatic brain injury, post-traumatic stress disorder, neurodegenerative diseases, and more. As a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Medicine, his primary focus is on the development and application of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) techniques to advance our understanding of cognitive decline in Parkinson’s disease.
evelopment and application of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) techniques to advance our understanding of cognitive decline in Parkinson’s disease.
