Calcium key to muscle function

Treatments for debilitating conditions such as muscular dystrophy could be found in the foreseeable future, thanks to a UQ study.

Dr Brad Launikonis, a 2008 UQ Foundation Research Excellence Award winner, is researching the way calcium moves in muscle fibres to regulate muscle function.

The School of Biomedical Science researcher, who won $90,000 in the annual awards, said understanding how muscles work at the cell level was essential if we were ever to develop effective treatments for muscle disorders.

The UQ Foundation Research Excellence Awards have been run for 10 years and are an initiative of UQ to recognise outstanding performance and leadership potential in early career researchers.

“We will be examining specific aspects of how calcium is regulated in the muscle cell, both in the short and long term, as required for normal function,” he said.

“We need to understand this in as much detail as possible to determine what is failing in disease or in the progression of age.

“This is what will allow therapeutic strategies to be developed or targets identified to improve function.”

Dr Launikonis said his research could have far-reaching effects, given that muscles were one thing all humans had in common.

“Skeletal muscle is responsible for movement and normal posture, thus is essential for independent living of individuals in society,” he said.

“We hope that our study of muscle will benefit diverse groups in society, from athletes wishing to understand how muscles fatigue, to groups working with dystrophy patients or other muscle degenerative states.”

The award money will allow Dr Launikonis and his team to buy a fluorescence microscope that will be used to image calcium in single, isolated muscle fibres using calcium-sensitive fluorescent dyes.

Media: Dr Launikonis (07 3365 4301) or Tegan Taylor at UQ Communications (07 3365 2659).