The structure of a spider toxin, the debate about electromagnetic radiation and a revolutionary diagnostic device will be among topics discussed at the Australian Society of Biophysics 21st Annual Conference starting today, Friday, October 3, at Biochemistry Building at the University of Melbourne. The conference will run from 9.30 Friday, October 3 to 3.15 Sunday, October 5.

The Structure of the Lethal Neurotoxin from the Sydney Funnel Web Spider

The Sydney funnel web spider, Atrax robustus has been responsible for at least 14 human deaths since 1927. Only the male funnel web spider is capable of inflicting a lethal bite. Bites are associated with local pain, salivation, skeletal muscle damage and disturbances in respiration, blood pressure and heart rate, followed by severe hypotension or death due to respiratory and circulatory failure. The public health risks of funnel web spiders have been considerably reduced since an effective antivenom was introduced in 1980.

There has been intense interest in learning more about the structure of the toxin to understand how it exerts its lethal effects in humans and therefore design better treatments. The session will look at work at the Biomolecular Research Institute (BRI) in Melbourne that has been able to determine the three-dimensional structure of the toxin.

The speaker will be Dr Paul Pallaghy (BRI).

(BRI was established in 1990 as a joint initiative between the CSIRO and the Strategic Industry Research Foundation).

Session time: Friday October 3, at 5pm.

The Health Effects of Electromagnetic Radiation

Mobile phones are at the cutting edge of the current telecommunications revolution. In a brief time they have moved from the car to the pocket and purse. Now they are set to invade the office and home, providing everybody with personal communication choices undreamed of less than a decade ago. Along with this explosion in the use of mobiles, have come concerns about their health effects.

On the one hand there is a wealth of anecdotal evidence of such effects and on the other there are baffling gaps in our understanding of how the relatively weak radiation emitted by these phones could influence our health. At the Australian Society for Biophysics meeting four experts from different fields will discuss how electromagnetic radiation of the type emitted by mobile phones and similar equipment might exert effects on biological systems. Some of the research points to the beneficial uses of these effects in biotechnology and some to possible explanations for the claimed deleterious health effects of mobile phone use.

The speakers will be Stan Barnett (CSIRO), Professor Michael Berry (Flinders University), Dr Peter French (Centre for Immunology, St Vincent's Hospital) and Professor Hans Coster (University of NSW).

Session time: Friday October 3, 11 am - 1pm

New Biosensors

Biosensors are a totally new class of electronic devices that combine a biological recognition mechanism with a physical transduction technique. In nature, the transduction mechanism for ultra-high sensitivity molecular detection is the switching on or off of ion channels in the cell membranes of appropriate tissues. The molecule to be detected interacts specifically with a receptor group on the ion channel to effect this switching.

Our sense of smell and things like pheromone signalling in insects operates this way. This principle of molecular detection has for a decade been regarded as the "Holy Grail" of biosensing because of its fundamental compatibility with both biology and electronics, as the ion channels act as electrical switches in the cell membranes.

Recently, this principle has for the first time been realised in a practical device, the AMBRI Biosensor, the world's first truly functioning "Nanomachine". This device successfully interfaces specific biological receptor molecules (such as antibodies) with a generic, mechanically robust and sensitive measurement technique based on synthetic ion channels in stable membranes. The device may be made sensitive to a wide range of substances, such as proteins, drugs, hormones, DNA, etc., currently in the micromolar to picomolar range.

One of the co-inventors of the technology will give, for the first time at an Australian scientific meeting, a detailed description of the device and its principle of operation.

The speaker will be Dr Ron Pace (Australian National University).

Session time: Saturday, 4 October 10.30am

More information:

Dr Ray Norton 03 9903 9650 or mobile 019 178 450
or
Doug Gale 03 9662 7332 or mobile 041 754 3633