Search Marsden awards 2008–2017
Search awarded Marsden Fund grants 2008–2017
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Fast-Start
Year Awarded: 2010
Title: Overcoming plant immune responses - the key to fungal symbiosis
Recipient(s): Dr A Mendoza Mendoza | PI | Lincoln University
Dr CM Brown | AI | University of Otago
Assoc Prof DR Greenwood | AI | The University of Auckland
Prof PS Schnable | AI | Iowa State University
Prof A Stewart | AI | Lincoln University
Public Summary: In nature, most plants are infested by fungi without any external manifestation of disease. These fungi are termed endophytes and are astonishingly diverse. Endophytes, improve plant growth, disease resistance and abiotic stress tolerance, while the fungi themselves obtain nutrients. Despite directly benefiting from this symbiosis, plants still react to endophytes colonization by activating their immune system. Nevertheless, the activation of the plant immune system does not prevent colonization by endophytes. How endophytes evade or suppress plant immune system is largely unknown. We hypothesise that a molecular dialogue between the endophytes and plant, predisposes successful colonization. By using the endophytic fungus Trichoderma and maize plants as the model system, we will address two key questions: How do plants and endophytes establish a friendly relationship?, What are the signals involved in the successful dialogue between plants and fungal endophytes during plant colonization?. By using a high technology approach we will identify the proteins secreted, the morphological changes and the genetic profiles of Trichoderma and maize plants during their interaction. Our study will significantly contribute to the understanding of how endophytic fungi modulate plant defenses and will provide fundamental new insights into processes required for the establishment of plant colonization by endophytic fungi.
Total Awarded: $260,870
Duration: 3
Host: Lincoln University
Contact Person: Dr A Mendoza Mendoza
Panel: CMP
Project ID: 10-LIU-016
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Fast-Start
Year Awarded: 2010
Title: Oxides on the inside: A step change in high temperature oxidation resistant materials technology
Recipient(s): Dr S Matthews | PI | Massey University
Public Summary: Components used at high temperature are often coated with thermal barrier coatings (TBC’s). These consist of an outer ceramic coating and an inner alloy “bond-coat” which provides oxidation protection and improved TBC adhesion. The bond-coat relies on the formation of a protective surface layer of Al2O3 to minimise oxidation. However, relying on a surface oxide has distinct limitations – consumption of aluminium from the bond-coat compromises the oxidation resistance, while oxides are prone to loss of adherence due to thermal stresses. It is widely acknowledged that formation of the bond-coat oxide layer is the core process leading to TBC failure. In a dramatic shift from conventional thinking, this work aims to overcome these limitations through the development of an Al4C3/Ni alloy composite coating material. This will be manipulated to form a continuous carbide phase. At high temperature this carbide will preferentially oxidise to form a continuous protective Al2O3 oxide network within the composite rather than on top of it. This will prevent consumption of oxide forming elements, minimise stress build up and improve the oxide adhesion. This totally original concept is a potential step change in high temperature materials technology.
Total Awarded: $260,870
Duration: 3
Host: Massey University
Contact Person: Dr S Matthews
Panel: EIS
Project ID: 10-MAU-155
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Fast-Start
Year Awarded: 2014
Title: Oxytocin: a safety brake preventing excessive activation of the stress axis
Recipient(s): Dr KJ Iremonger | PI | University of Otago
Dr V Grinevich | AI | University of Heidelberg
Public Summary: Uncontrolled stress hormone release is detrimental to health. In particular, persistently elevated levels of stress hormones can lead to both neurological and metabolic diseases. While activation of hypothalamic corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) neurons enhances stress hormone release, the neural circuits preventing excessive stress hormone secretion are unclear. Oxytocin is a neuropeptide that is released within the brain that acts to reduce anxiety and regulate social behaviour. Oxytocin is also released within the hypothalamus during stress where it acts to inhibit the stress response. Oxytocin neurons are in close proximity to CRH neurons and it is our hypothesis that local oxytocin release acts as a safety brake to prevent excessive CRH neuron activation. To address this hypothesis, we will use electrophysiology to determine how oxytocin regulates the excitability of CRH neurons in brain slices from mice. We will also use optogenetics to induce endogenous oxytocin release within hypothalamic brain slices. Finally, we will study how exposure to stress modifies oxytocin signalling onto CRH neurons. This current proposal will advance our limited understanding of how stress axis excitability is controlled by local circuits within the hypothalamus. This information may provide useful therapeutic targets for modulating stress axis output and therefore stress hormone release.
Total Awarded: $300,000
Duration: 3
Host: University of Otago
Contact Person: Dr KJ Iremonger
Panel: BMS
Project ID: 14-UOO-164
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Standard
Year Awarded: 2016
Title: Parasitic Puppeteers - How do They Pull the Strings?
Recipient(s): Professor NJ Gemmell | PI | University of Otago
Dr RC Day | AI | University of Otago
Dr F Maure | AI | University of Otago
Professor R Poulin | AI | University of Otago
Public Summary: Parasites can have profound effects on the animal hosts they invade, manipulating host biology with exquisite precision to enhance host-to-host transmission. One of the most extraordinary of these host manipulations is the water-seeking behaviour that some nematodes and hairworms induce in their hosts so that the worms might exit the host and reproduce. The process is the stuff of science fiction; the worm hijacks the host’s central nervous system forcing it to seek water. Once water is found the adult worm, often many times the size of the host, emerges, sacrificing the host. This amazing alteration in behaviour is induced by parasitic worms spanning two phyla (Nematoda and Nematomorpha) and is observed in a variety of arthropod hosts, notably crickets, weta, earwigs, and sandhoppers, leading us to hypothesise that a common and conserved mechanism is being utilised by the parasites to induce this behaviour in their hosts. Here we propose to couple field and laboratory studies of two phylogenetically distinct hosts and their parasites, with powerful genomic and bioinformatic comparisons to elucidate the trigger and genetic cascade through which these parasitic puppeteers elicit this highly conserved, yet astonishing behavioural response.
Total Awarded: $830,000
Duration: 3
Host: University of Otago
Contact Person: Professor NJ Gemmell
Panel: EEB
Project ID: 16-UOO-152
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Fast-Start
Year Awarded: 2017
Title: Pattern Discovery from Big Medical Data
Recipient(s): Dr X Zhu | PI | Massey University Auckland
Professor D Shen | AI | University of North Carolina
Professor HT Shen | AI | The University of Queensland
Public Summary: Utilising domain experts’ experience and knowledge, automatic medical image analysis (i.e., pattern discovery from medical images) can achieve better performance than doctors. Current automated techniques have been successful in dealing with small medical-image datasets, but they are neither effective nor efficient in dealing with large-scale datasets (big data), irregular datasets, which have heterogeneous or abnormal information, or predicting the progress of illness.
To overcome these limitations, this project aims to develop (i) new medical image data pre-processing methods for big data; (ii) new machine learning methods to analyse irregular multi-modality medical data to satisfy the different requirements of real applications; and (iii) novel personalised disease classifiers and predictive models to improve the accuracy of disease diagnosis and longitudinal changes of patients. This project also intends to couple these new techniques with current methods to develop an automatic disease self-diagnosis demonstration system, which could help a patient to conduct self-diagnosis before meeting a doctor and assist doctors to conduct computer-aided diagnosis.
Through the advances made in this project, we expect to improve the capability of current medical image analysis methods, form a unified framework that can handle different types of medical images, and be of benefit to society and reduce the pressure on doctors.
Total Awarded: $300,000
Duration: 3
Host: Massey University Auckland
Contact Person: Dr X Zhu
Panel: MIS
Project ID: 17-MAU-141
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Standard
Year Awarded: 2014
Title: Personal geographies and global networks: William Colenso and the Victorian Republic of Letters
Recipient(s): Dr SJ Shep | PI | Victoria University of Wellington
Public Summary: William Colenso (1811-1899) was one of the most accomplished polymaths of Victorian New Zealand, yet his contributions to Maori, Pakeha and imperial history have been under-estimated, dismissed, or virtually forgotten. This project features new digital humanities approaches and advanced computational science tools used to identify and analyse Colenso's local and international intellectual, scientific, linguistic, religious, and political networks using his extensive published writings and voluminous letter correspondence. Text mining, social network analysis, topic modeling, and geospatial visualisation offer new insights into Colenso's multi-facetted identity as well as his pivotal role in a global system of information exchange and knowledge production.
This project aims to promote widespread recognition of Colenso; bring scattered resources together for the first time for research, teaching and general interest; ensure the preservation of and access to unique resources by and about Colenso; develop new digital tools for biographical research; and foster new awareness and create new knowledge for a new generation of Colenso scholars, both in New Zealand and overseas. In short, the project will contribute to a revisionist understanding of New Zealand’s place in the Victorian world and the world’s place in Victorian New Zealand.
Total Awarded: $540,000
Duration: 3
Host: Victoria University of Wellington
Contact Person: Dr SJ Shep
Panel: HUM
Project ID: 14-VUW-028
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Fast-Start
Year Awarded: 2012
Title: Photodissociation of nitrous oxide in the atmosphere
Recipient(s): Dr JR Lane | PI | University of Waikato
Prof SH Kable | AI | The University of Sydney
Public Summary: Nitrous oxide (N2O) is now the dominant stratospheric ozone-depleting substance and the third most significant greenhouse gas. The concentration of N2O in Earth’s atmosphere is steadily increasing, primarily due to increased agricultural activity. In New Zealand, 95% of N2O emissions are from agricultural soils and hence understanding the fate of N2O in the atmosphere is of critical importance to our economy. N2O is a relatively unreactive molecule that only breaks down in the atmosphere by absorbing solar radiation in the ultraviolet region (a process termed photodissociation). At the low temperatures of the upper atmosphere where this process occurs, individual molecules aggregate together to form weakly bound complexes. We propose that when N2O forms complexes with the other molecules in the atmosphere, it more strongly absorbs solar radiation resulting in a faster rate of photodissociation. Furthermore, entirely new products become available as compared to photodissociation of isolated N2O molecules. We will investigate the atmospheric implications of these previously unconsidered N2O complexes using a combined theoretical and experimental approach. Our findings will redefine the present understanding of atmospheric N2O chemistry and will ultimately lead to improved atmospheric models, which are vital for quantifying the environmental effects of anthropogenic N2O emissions.
Total Awarded: $300,000
Duration: 3
Host: University of Waikato
Contact Person: Dr JR Lane
Panel: PCB
Project ID: 12-UOW-007
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Fast-Start
Year Awarded: 2017
Title: Photoluminescence shines a light on the exemplary optoelectronic properties in hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites
Recipient(s): Dr K Chen | PI | Victoria University of Wellington
Professor HJ Snaith | AI | University of Oxford
Public Summary: Hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites are a new generation of semiconductors with properties ideal for optoelectronic devices; strong light absorption and emission, excellent charge conduction, and facile material synthesis with the flexibility to tune properties by varying their composition. In spite of the rapid advance of applications like photovoltaic cells, light emitting devices and lasers over the past four years, fundamental questions remain about the origin of the exemplary optoelectronic properties in these materials. In particular, the timescale and mechanism of charge carrier cooling remains controversial, and little is known about how quantum confinement effects are manifest, or the kinetic rate laws governing lasing in these materials. Time-resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy is the ideal tool to probe charge carrier behavior in emissive semiconductors; however, previous ultrafast photoluminescence studies for the past 30 years suffered from narrow spectral bandwidth. We will employ the unique ultrafast broadband photoluminescence spectroscopy method that we developed, where broad detection bandwidth enables us to directly resolve the energetic distribution of charges on sub-picosecond timescales. In collaboration with the Oxford group who pioneered these materials, we are positioned to address previously inaccessible questions and systematically reveal the mechanisms underlying the extraordinary properties of the perovskites.
Total Awarded: $300,000
Duration: 3
Host: Victoria University of Wellington
Contact Person: Dr K Chen
Panel: PCB
Project ID: 17-VUW-154
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Fast-Start
Year Awarded: 2010
Title: Photosystem II - the enzyme that never sleeps
Recipient(s): Dr MF Hohmann-Mariott | PI | University of Otago
Public Summary: Photosystem II (PSII) is the multisubunit protein complex at the heart of solar energy conversion in all plants. In the light, PSII catalyses the generation of electrons, protons and oxygen from water. Without light input PSII appears to catalyse the reverse reaction, consuming oxygen, electrons and protons in the dark. This finding may explain experimental data suggesting the functional and structural heterogeneity of PSII, and alternative photosynthetic electron transport pathways. I plan to identify the molecular components and the macromolecular environment that facilitate and control PSII-mediated electron disposal.
Total Awarded: $260,870
Duration: 3
Host: University of Otago
Contact Person: Dr MF Hohmann-Mariott
Panel: CMP
Project ID: 10-UOO-188
Fund Type: Marsden Fund
Category: Fast-Start
Year Awarded: 2010
Title: Physiological and pathological regulation of the cardiac ryanodine receptor (RyR2) by RyR2-interacting proteins
Recipient(s): Dr PP Jones | PI | University of Otago
Public Summary: Cardiac arrhythmias remain the leading cause of death in patients with heart disease. An important trigger for arrhythmias is the inappropriate opening of the cardiac ryanodine receptor (RyR2). However, the mechanism by which these openings occur is still not well understood. We have found that mutations within RyR2 and certain arrhythmogenic drugs increase the frequency of RyR2 openings by increasing the sensitivity of RyR2 to intra-store sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) calcium. These data suggest that alterations in RyR2’s SR calcium sensitivity represent a common mechanism underlying arrhythmia. RyR2 is part of a large macromolecular complex with other binding proteins and the loss of these proteins can increase the activity of RyR2 and lead to heart disease. This project will determine whether the interaction of these RyR2-binding proteins with RyR2 alters the opening of RyR2, using protein biochemistry and biophysics, coupled with advanced SR calcium imaging in ventricular myocytes from transgenic animals. Importantly it aims to determine whether this occurs through the common mechanism of altering the SR calcium sensitivity of RyR2. A better understanding of how RyR2-interacting proteins regulate RyR2 will lead to new insights into the causes, and ultimately prevention of arrhythmia.
Total Awarded: $260,870
Duration: 3
Host: University of Otago
Contact Person: Dr PP Jones
Panel: BMS
Project ID: 10-UOO-205