The 2019 public lecture before the Brain Health Research Centre annual conference will be given by Dr Belind Henry, a high regarded midcareer scientist in the field of Neuroendocrinology. Her talk is entitled "Lighting the Fire in Fat: Why women are protected against metabolic disease".
Women typically have more adipose tissue than men, yet they are relatively protected against developing obesity-associated cardiovascular diseases and type 2 diabetes. Across the menopausal transition women tend to gain weight and become susceptible to metabolic and cardiovascular diseases. This weight gain and loss of cardiometabolic protection, is at least partly driven by declining levels of estrogen, a predominant ovarian hormone. Dr Henry's lecture will describe how the brain controls body weight in young healthy men and women and the importance of the ovarian hormones in body weight regulation.
Dr Henry holds a joint academic/ research position in the Department of Physiology, Monash University. She has served on the Endocrine Society of Australia council since 2010 and is the current President of Australasian Women in Endocrinology. Dr Henry leads to the Metabolic Neuroendocrine research group at Monash Biomedical Discovery Institute. Her research centres on the discovery of novel means of altering energy expenditure through modulation of the brain as a mechanism for prevention or treatment of obesity. Her work is particularly focused on the process of thermogenesis and the mechanisms that underpin this process in fat and muscle tissues.
This free talk will be held at 5.30pm on Wednesday 5 June in the Dunedin Public Art Gallery auditorium.