Friday 27 November 2020 9:17am
Emeritus Professor Warren Tate gives the 2020 BHRC Lecture.
Emeritus Professor Warren Tate gave the Annual BHRC Lecture on Monday, 23rd November. Warren spoke about chronic fatigue syndrome, known as ME/CFS – a debilitating and lifelong disease.
Lecture recording
Being from a “ME/CFS family”, Warren's passion and frustration for the disease was clear to see. Despite affecting an estimated 25,000 people in New Zealand, and 15 million people worldwide, the disease is misunderstood and work on it is rarely funded. Up until as recently as 2015, many believed that it was a psychological phenomenon.
However, it is now clear that there is a non-psychological basis behind the symptoms ME/CFS patients experience, including disturbances to cognition (known as 'brain fog'), inflammation, energy regulation, circadian clock, and oxidative stress, and fatigue.
Recently, ME/CFS has received more attention, as infections such as COVID-19 can act as a trigger for the disease. The symptoms many patients experience in 'Long COVID' are very similar to those of ME/CFS patients. But it's not all bad news –treating or preventing COVID-19 early can mitigate the long-lasting effects.
Poster session
A Poster Session accompanied this year's Annual Lecture. Many BHRC members presented posters of their research, and judges selected the best poster in each category.
- Jennifer Palmer won Best Honours/Masters student poster.
- Best PhD student poster was too close to call and was jointly won by Sophie Mathieson and Rhys Livingstone.
- Dr Kristina Smiley won Best Postdoctoral fellow/Research fellow poster.
- People choice award for Best PI poster was won by Associate Professor Stephanie Hughes.
Congratulations to all the winners!
BHRC members discuss their research in the format of poster presentations.