Sutherland makes top 50 list

trevor.kenney — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 15:17:34 +0000

Dr. Robert Sutherland, a neuroscience researcher at the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge's Canadian Centre for Behavioural Neuroscience (CCBN), is among 50 people named by Alberta Venture Magazine as their 50 Most Influential Albertans for 2011.

Sutherland made the list for a breakthrough discovery last year in which he and his team confirmed the re-generation of cerebral cortex cells in adult mammals.

The research focused on a part of the brain called the hippocampus, a seahorse-shaped region of the brain responsible for short- and long-term memory storage and retrieval. This is an area that is especially sensitive to illnesses or injuries that can create memory loss, explains Sutherland. It's also a part of the brain that throughout adult life spontaneously creates new cells that are able to easily find their correct position in the brain's circuitry.

The team began by killing off about half of these cells by depriving them of corticosterone, an important hormone the cells need to function, causing the rats to develop memory issues very similar to humans suffering with dementia. Through a combination of a specific protein therapy, an enriched living environment and exercise, the researchers were able to re-grow the lost brain cells and prove that the rats had regained their memory function.

Regenerating brain cells is a problem neuroscientists have been struggling with for many years, with limited success. The challenge stems from the nature of the brain itself. "If you open up a laptop and take a look at the circuit board, every portion you look at has a sophisticated set of connections with other pieces," says Sutherland. "The brain is even more complicated."

For more on this discovery, follow this link.

Other persons honoured by Venture include U of L Honorary Degree recipients Gwyn Morgan and David Schindler. While previous U of L connections to the Alberta Venture list include Sutherland's colleague Dr. Bruce MacNaughton, sociology researcher and trend tracker Dr. Reg Bibby, and U of L Chancellor Emeritus Richard Davidson.

Read the Alberta Venture profile and additional biographies of the other 49 individuals by following this link.

Davidson one of province's most influential people

trevor.kenney — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 21:34:58 +0000

Richard Davidson, the ��Ѹ��Դ��߿�Ƭ of Lethbridge's current Chancellor, veteran Lethbridge lawyer and "volunteer extraordinaire" as described by Alberta Venture magazine – has made that publication's list of the 50 most influential people in the Province of Alberta.

Davidson is no stranger to accolades but humble about his accomplishments within and outside the legal profession – many of which involve serving a seemingly endless list of community organizations, including the U of L, where he has held the Chancellor's role since 2007.

Among many other duties, Davidson presides over the institution's Convocation ceremonies, where he has met and shaken hands with thousands of new U of L graduates.

He was also recently named the Rotary/Lethbridge Herald 2010 Citizen of the Year in May 2010, and as part of that ceremony, received the Key to the City and was also named a Paul Harris Fellow, a significant honour within the Rotary Organization.

"When you earn your livelihood in a community and when you raise your family in the community," Richardson says, "You have a duty to give something back to the community. I feel like I've been able to do that, and I've been happy to do that. I've enjoyed it."

The Alberta Venture list also includes a number of people with connections to the U of L, including honorary degree recipients Harley Hotchkiss (LLD '07), Eric Newell (LLD '05) and Bruce Carson, the first executive director of the Canada School for Energy and the Environment, a collaboration between the universities of Alberta, Calgary and Lethbridge.

UNews - Venture

Sutherland makes top 50 list

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Davidson one of province's most influential people

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