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breakthrough December 2011 | Issue 18 Professor John Mattick AO FAA Image courtesy of Paul Harris, The Garvan Institute of Medical seesaw photography Research recently announced the appointment of Professor John Mattick AO FAA as the Institute’s next Executive Director, following the retirement of Professor John Shine AO FAA. Professor Mattick will begin his tenure at Garvan in January 2012, and is taking every opportunity in the lead-up to his arrival to meet Garvan staff , board members and supporters. Read more about Professor Mattick, his impact on medical research, and his hopes for his time at the Garvan on page 5. Making NEWS ‘Brown fat’ is believed to be a wondrous tissue that burns energy to generate heat, that could help us fi ght obesity. We are obese when we have too much ‘white fat’, which is basically an organ of energy storage. In contrast, brown fat is like a heat generator. Around 50g of white fat stores 300 kilocalories of energy. The same amount of brown fat burns 300 kilocalories a day. Garvan researchers have shown that brown fat can be grown in culture from stem cells biopsied from adults – giving hope that one day we might be able to either grow someone’s brown fat outside the body and then transplant it, or else stimulate its growth using drugs. Identical twins have identical genomes, but that is where Inside this issue: it stops. There are subtle diff erences in their personalities, how they look, how they act and in their susceptibility From the CEO 2 to disease. How can this be? According to scientists Opinion 2 from Garvan and Queensland Medical Research Institute, it all depends on how the “epigenome” is modifi ed Garvan welcomes Professor John Mattick 3 by the environment. More specifi cally, it depends on exactly how particular parts of the genome are aff ected Cures can take more than a lifetime 4 by ‘methylation’, or the attachment of hydrocarbon Type 2 diabetes 5 molecules - ‘methyl groups’, that literally change the voice of the genome, silencing some genes and Staff profi le – Dr Ann McCormack 6 amplifying others. These fi ndings are based on an eight- year study involving 512 adolescent twins (128 identical Fundraiser profi le – ‘Team Phil’ 6 twin pairs, as well as 128 non-identical twin pairs), with an Ask Garvan 7 average age of 14.15 years. First glimpse inside the Kinghorn Cancer Centre 7 Garvan scientists have discovered that a single gene In memory of a remarkable man 7 controls a very complex process, apparently forming the crucial link between eating a high fat diet and developing Clinical studies 8 diabetes. Compounds are already being developed for blocking the gene – known as Id1 – as it has known Coming up 8 adverse eff ects in cancer. This drug development work In memoriam 8 would very much shorten the path from discovery to prospective treatment in the case of Type 2 diabetes. breakthrough From the CEO Opinion Welcome to the fi nal issue of breakthrough for the year. As you will read, we have some very exciting news with the appointment of our new Executive Director, Professor John Mattick AO FAA who is joining us early in As I retire as Executive Director at the end of the year, I 2012. Professor Mattick has an outstanding take this opportunity to refl ect on the past 20 years at this reputation as one of Australia’s leading remarkable institution. I have been extremely privileged scientists and will bring a wonderful range to be at the Garvan and to witness fi rsthand the many of skills to the Garvan. exciting research discoveries that have emanated from I am sure that many of our supporters will be the institute. It clearly is an institute that should make all delighted to know that our current Executive Australians very proud and I have been continually humbled Director, Professor John Shine will not be by observing every day the generosity of our supporters and going very far way – in fact, he won’t even the dedication, intelligence, creativity and commitment of all be leaving the building! Professor Shine the staff . While we all appreciate our good fortune working will return to the lab to further pursue his in research, we are all very aware of the responsibility that passion for medical research. comes with it – to ensure that the critical trust and support As the year draws to a close, it is wonderful of our community is honoured by a focus on producing the to look back at some of the amazing very best research and a focus on delivering improved health breakthroughs that have been made here outcomes for all. at Garvan in areas as diverse as pancreatic Although the past 20 years has seen amazing progress, cancer, childhood deafness, asthma and the next decade promises even more. The Garvan has been Type 2 diabetes (to name a few!) most fortunate to attract Professor John Mattick as the next The year has also been great personally Executive Director. John is an outstanding Australian and for some of our researchers who have won an international leader in the analysis and understanding of prestigious awards. Congratulations to Dr the human genome – the area which is truly bringing us into Alex Swarbrick who received the Cancer the era of personalised medicine. Under John’s leadership Institute of NSW’s 2011 Premier’s Fellow of and with your ongoing support, the exciting growth planned the Year Award and Dr David Chang who for Garvan (the fi rst example being the Kinghorn Cancer received the CINSW 2011 Premier’s Scholar Centre), will rapidly come to fruition. of the Year Award, as well as a Pfi zer Oncology International Studentship. To all our wonderful supporters – thank you for helping Garvan continue its vital, world- class work in 2011, and we look forward to your ongoing support in 2012. My best wishes to you and your loved ones for a safe and enjoyable festive season. Yours sincerely, Andrew Giles Garvan Research Foundation Professor John Shine AO FAA Executive Director December 2011 | Issue 18 3 Welcome: AO FAA Professor John Mattick Garvan welcomes new “After heading IMB and its forebear for Executive Director, 18 years, I realised Professor John Mattick that I had three big AO FAA jobs. I was running an institute of over 400 Professor John Mattick, holder of people. I had research a prestigious NHMRC Australia I wanted to pursue, Fellowship at the University of because I thought I Queensland and the inaugural had seen something Director of the University’s Institute nobody else had - that of Molecular Bioscience (IMB), has human genetics had been misunderstood been appointed as Garvan’s new for the past 50 years. I Executive Director. also had an extremely Professor Mattick is excited to be supportive family that joining Garvan, which he considers I wanted to give more to be an outstanding medical time to. I was confi dent research institute. He also believes it that I could do any to be best placed to lead Australia two of those jobs well. into the next generation of medical However, by trying research. to do all three, I was compromising all of Although currently residing in them. Brisbane, Professor Mattick is a born “There was really no and bred Sydney-sider. Professor John Mattick AO FAA choice. In 2006 I elected to go Image courtesy of Paul Harris, seesaw photography “I grew up here, mainly in the inner back to research for a while, as I did west. I lived for a while as a student not want to die wondering,” said of our development and cognitive at the bohemian (Woolloomooloo) Professor Mattick. complexity. It also opens many end of Victoria Street,” (the same avenues for entirely novel It is this research that has street on which Garvan is located). therapeutic approaches. transformed the way scientists now In 1988, Professor Mattick was lured think about the human genome, our Of Garvan’s future, Professor to Queensland by an invitation evolution and our brain. Previously, Mattick says, “There is presently from the University of Queensland it was believed that only a few per a great opportunity to do ‘next to apply for a Foundation cent of the genome (the protein- generation’ science and medicine, Professorship in Molecular Biology, coding part and nearby regulatory using the amazing advances in and at the same time, to start a new sequences) was actually useful. The technology that have occurred over centre in molecular biology. rest was labeled “Junk DNA”. By the past decade, especially in DNA challenging this long-held belief, sequencing, and thereby to connect “By the end of the fi rst fi ve years, Professor Mattick was able to our capabilities directly with the we were self-suffi cient. A few years show that this “Junk DNA” actually health and medical concerns of the later, we had more research income specifi es a massive hidden layer of community. I think this will be the than another local university. It was regulation that directs the processes true fl owering of medical research due to the vision we set out and of our development from a single institutes, and I want Garvan, judicious appointments of gifted cell to a fi nely sculpted organism of through its close collaboration people. This is a great formula, 100 trillion cells that can walk and with St Vincent’s Hospital, and and the Centre matured into the talk. This insight has made scientists the opportunities presented by the Institute for Molecular Bioscience re-think biology and consider a joint Kinghorn Cancer Centre, to (IMB), now recognised as one of previously unknown level of the lead the way.” Australia’s best.

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