Matteo Santoro SNG 2016 Best Presentation

The annual meeting of the Scottish Neuroscience Group, hosted by the University of Strathclyde, was held in Glasgow on 26th August 2016.  This one day meeting of approximately 100 delegates included a packed timetable of oral presentations and posters from PhD students and other researchers, culminating in a lecture entitled Clocks, Exercise and Mental Health from Professor Hugh Piggins of the University of Manchester.

Digitimer was pleased to help support this celebration of Scottish Neuroscience by donating a couple of prizes, which were awarded to the best oral and poster presentations by postgraduate students.  The oral presentation winner was Matteo Santoro from Aberdeen University, while the poster winner was Rebecca Openshaw, studying at Glasgow University.

 

[su_lightbox type=”image” src=”/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Rebecca-Openshaw-sng-2016-Best-Poster.jpg” mobile=”yes” class=””]Rebecca Openshaw SNG 2016 Best Poster Digitimer[/su_lightbox]Rebecca Openshaw receiving her award from Prof Hugh Piggins & Dr Ros Langston

 

In her winning poster, Rebecca highlighted the importance of developing effective therapies to treat psychiatric disorders and how this relies on animal models that closely mimic the pathologic state. Rebecca used a touchscreen rodent gambling task to investigate the decision making abilities of mice deficient in a gene associated with schizophrenia.  Affected mice displayed deficits that closely resemble those seen in patients with schizophrenia and, along with other data revealing a distinctive pattern of cognitive deficits, are showing promise for being able to be used as a model to aid development of improved therapies.

We would like to wish both winners our very best for their continued studies and future careers in neuroscience.