Victoria University of Wellington researcher Dr Melanie McConnell has had her upcoming HRC-funded project profiled on Radio New Zealand.
This month Dr Melanie McConnell was awarded $1,036,746 in HRC funding to fund her three-year project, which could change the way we treat cellular diseases such as brain cancer and Alzheimer’s.
Dr McConnell says the project is based on a discovery made five years ago during her time at the Malaghan Institute of Medical Research, which is based at Victoria University, and was further developed during her current post at Victoria.
The project centres on the discovery that mitochondria can move between cells.
“It’s a new observation that goes against all the dogma in the textbooks. At first, people refused to accept our data. We’ve always assumed mitochondria have to renew themselves within the cell, but the research conducted at Malaghan with Professor Mike Berridge shows that mitochondria can transfer between cells.
“This is potentially a double-edged sword. Cells that are injured in neurodegenerative diseases could use mitochondrial transfer to survive, but cancer cells could also use this process to resist treatment,” she says.
The outcome of the research could change how we treat neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and motor neurone disease, where injured brain cells die, and also brain cancers where injured cells are actively growing and resist attempts to kill them.
Listen to Dr McConnell on Radio New Zealand.
News article courtesy of Victoria University of Wellington