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The Peter Walsh Scholarship
The purpose of scholarship is to support PhD students dedicated to research on Huntington’s disease and/or its impacts. This scholarship provides an exceptional opportunity for PhD students across Australia to apply for funds that can be utilised as a top up, to assist in the publication of research and/or the purchase of essential equipment to complete research.
Andrew Gleason
64-CuATSM PET and QSM MRI as Biomarkers of Ferroptosis in Neurodegenerative Disorders
Jessica Kaplonyi
Improving care at the end of life for people with Huntington's disease, their families, and their caregivers.
Katharine Huynh
Computerised cognitive training in Huntington’s disease
Yenni Lie
Managing Huntington’s disease with a multidisciplinary perspective
What difference will this project make?
A neuroimaging biomarker of ferroptosis has the potential to assist in identifying the onset of neurodegeneration, thus assisting in the clinical diagnosis of symptomatic HD. More importantly, the identification of potential disease-modifying pathways in HD has the prospect of leading to new therapeutics that could slow disease progression.
What difference will this project make?
This research will re-emphasise the importance of having early, frequent, and documented end-of-life discussions, but also provide a tangible end-of-life intervention co-designed by, and specifically for, the HD community.
My work will engage the clinical care community, researchers, palliative care community, and the HD community to design a feasible, accessible, and useful tool to ensure physical comfort, mental and emotional needs, spiritual needs, and practical tasks are conducted as per individual preferences and requests.
What difference will this project make?
The research study may directly benefit participants and their families by offering them an intervention to improve their cognitive function. Furthermore, participants of a previous trial of Huntington’s disease in the UK reported improved emotional well-being, involvement of friends and family, and sense of achievement.
One session of cognitive training each week will also be conducted as a remote group session, so participants will be able to meet other individuals with Huntington’s disease.
What difference will this project make?
This project will help decipher how multidisciplinary care may be best delivered to improve
the identification and responsiveness to unique patient and caregiver’s needs, promote selfmanagement and enhance the quality of care, quality of life, consumer satisfaction and health
outcomes for people with HD and their families or caregivers.
Andrew Gleason
In spite of its clear genetic origin, the molecular mechanisms of cell death in HD have not yet been clearly defined. Affected cells do not show signs of classical forms of cell death such as apoptosis or necrosis. There is emerging evidence of ferroptosis in HD cell lines, animal models, and affected humans. For example, mutant HTT fragments interfere with anti-oxidant gene transcription, cause mitochondrial abnormalities, and lead to an increase in reactive oxygen species. This project aims to determine whether ferroptosis is detectable in vivo in patients with HD and other neurodegenerative disorders using a novel positron-emission tomography (PET) ligand, 64Cu(ATSM) and quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
Jessica Kaplonyi
My PhD work aims to investigate and improve end-of-life care in HD. My PhD projects will co-design and implement an education-based awareness intervention for community members, clinicians, and other stakeholders. The intervention will focus on how to discuss and implement the best end-of-life care, taking into account the viewpoints, preferences, and values of all involved, together with the evidence. My project will involve people living with HD, community members, families, and members of the medical and allied health care networks in improving palliative care, and will focus on community involvement and engagement.
Katharine Huyhn
This PhD project will examine whether cognitive training improves cognitive function in Huntington’s disease after a 3-month intervention. Participants will be randomised to a training group, or a control group. The training group will complete two 1-hour sessions of cognitive training on their personal computers each week, while the control group will receive monthly newsletters on lifestyle factors linked to cognition, and access cognitive training after 3 months. By testing participants before and after the intervention, we will assess the benefits of brain training on cognitive function, mood and quality of life. We will also look at its mechanisms by examining changes in brain networks.
Find out more about the Brain Training Study here
Yenni Lie
The purpose of this project is threefold. First, to review the existing multidisciplinary care practices in HD around the world. Second, to provide the first systematic documentation and quantitative analysis of HD multidisciplinary care practices in an Australian publicly funded outpatient context. Third, to assess the impact of multidisciplinary care structures on outcomes among people with HD and their caregivers through an initial retrospective then subsequent prospective evaluations.