Autor: Marietta (Seite 1 von 2)

From Sunday 23^rd of April to Wednesday 26^th of April the international British Neuroscience Association’s festival of neuroscience of 2023 took place at the Brighton Centre. And please check out the view of one of the conference rooms:

As a systematic musicologist with only very specific knowledge of neuroscience in relation to music – as in what happens in the brain when we listen to music or making music ourselves – Lucy, one of my PhD supervisors, had suggested to join the conference and present a preregistration poster of our MMMP-project to learn more about the neuroscientific side of Parkinson’s research as well as getting feedback on our work from a different perspective. And, wow, I can tell you, it was a buzzing time and fascinating experience that I wouldn’t want to miss. So, thank you very much, Lucy!

I arrived on Saturday to give myself the chance to see something of Brighton as well. It is an amazing city that feels like it is buzzing with all the excitement of the people in it. Unfortunately, the weather has been quite mixed, but after living in the UK for about 2 months, I now know that is very normal and the weather can change every 10 minutes.

On Sunday morning, after collecting my badge and getting lost in the Brighton Centre (really it is like a huge maze and it happened to other people as well, so, totally not my fault), I visited the first parallel session about the neuropsychiatry of neurodegenerative diseases hosted by the British Neuropsychiatry Association. After the lunch break and some mingling, I attended the patient and public involvement (PPI) workshop conducted by Parkinson’s UK and researchers who have years of experience in doing PPI work. This workshop was especially helpful to me and my PhD research. Indeed, I have already learned much about PPI work due to my work for the MMMP-project, but it was great hearing the inside thoughts of Parkinson’s UK on it as well as their guidelines. Even more exciting, a lovely person with Parkinson’s was also part of the facilitating team as a so-called Parkinson’s contributor. They also provided us with a lot of literature tips which is also great for my PhD. During the first poster session I had the chance to talk to a researcher developing a new questionnaire to assess psychiatric symptoms in neurodegenerative conditions by synthesizing existing standardized questionnaires. We were able to chat about their way of choosing the appropriate questionnaire to assess the symptom of apathy which provided a lot of supportive information for me since I’m focusing on apathy in Parkinson’s in my PhD thesis. After four talks about research about hippocampal neurons, the BNA 2023 festival was officially opened with a great opening ceremony and four talks about research credibility in neuroscience. This was followed by the opening reception.

On Monday, after listening to more fascinating talks and having nice conversations during coffee and lunch breaks, I got to present my poster for about 2 hours. Even though the methods of the project are not neuroscientific, I talked to a lot of interested people about it and exchanged contact details. It was great having neuroscience research asking questions and providing feedback from a different perspective. Ellen Poliakoff, who I had met last year at our concert ‘Playlist for Parkinson’s LIVE’ in Manchester, was also presenting a poster right next to me. Afterwards she introduced me to some of her PhD students and invited me to visit her team and give a talk about my work in the next months. So awesome! 😀

On Tuesday I attended a workshop (amongst more talks and poster presentations of course) about research communication delivered by editors of the ‘Inspire the Brain’ magazine. They provided a lot of useful tips on how to communicate your researcher on a lay level to help engage the public more.

On the last day of the conference, I went to a special session called ‘Desert Island Discs Papers’ in which researchers talked about inspiring papers, their careers, and what keeps them motivated when it comes down to writing a paper. They provided a lot of interesting and useful trips, such as having a dog with you that unconditionally supports you throughout the writing process is key. I might have to try this for my thesis then 😉

It was also great to get to spend some more time with Lucy who was also attend the conference. She has introduced me to a lot of people, and we had a great time trying out different seafoods at restaurants in the evenings.

After the end of the conference, I even had some time to try out some of the arcade machines at the famous Brighton Palace Pier.

Even though I haven’t won anything, it was still a lot of fun! I also let Zoltar predict my future, and according to him more relaxing times lie in front of me. I hope this means the next measurements, the concert and the ‘Songlines’ course will be fine?

Anyways, I will see you for the next read. As always, please feel free to leave any comments and have a look at the other posts.

Many thanks, see you soon and take care!

Hello again research friends, enthusiasts, and those who would like to become one!

I would also like to wish you all a happy new year in Hertfordshire, UK!

Shortly before Christmas we had got ethical clearance for doing the Songlines course in the UK 2023, so I, once again, visited the UK to start getting people enthusiastic about our project. For this reason, we organized two talks at local Parkinson’s groups in Hertfordshire.

The first one took place at the Hampson Park Community Centre in Stevenage, which is the same venue as for our course Songlines. Lovely Jane invited me to give the talk, and I have to admit that I have been quite nervous, but luckily Penny, who is another PhD student at UH, was there to support me, thank you very much! 🙂

We decided it would be nice to go to the talk together and introduce ourselves properly because besides our brilliant facilitator, Maria, Penny and I will be helping to run the course. As all of you know that music is quite a crucial part of our research project, and for Songlines is going to be a music and movement course, we thought it might be funny to introduce ourselves via a favorite piece of music. Here are the two pieces, and I leave it to you to guess which one belongs to who 😉

I think the attendees liked our tunes, immediately the ice was broken, and my nervousness was gone. It really was a great experience, and I felt like everybody enjoyed themselves. It was also fantastic to see that the people liked what we are doing, and they would very much like to be a part of it. I think they especially liked our little dance exercise…oh sorry, I meant to write “moving to music” exercise 😉

On Thursday 19^th of January, Penny and I went to the West Herts branch of Parkinson’s UK to give the talk again. This time my supervisor, Lucy, was joining us because she knows most of the attendees. The second talk was also a wonderful experience, and the people were just as lovely as the Big Movers. The response to our project and the Songlines course was amazing and I hope some of the attendees will take part in it.

I’m flying back home today, but I will be back in the UK by the end of February. That is when my year abroad starts officially and I’m very much looking forward to it! 🙂

Thank you for reading this blog, and please feel free to leave some comments. I am very interested in your opinion. I can’t wait to keep you posted with all the exciting things going to happen.

Take care and see you for the next read!

Am 1. Januar ging es für Dawn und Sabrina auf die Reise nach Lille, um unser Projekt in Frankreich vorzustellen und neue Kooperationen zu schaffen. Sabrina konnte dabei sich über unser Motion Capture Lab austauschen und Ihre ersten Daten dem Team REBOOT (Universität in Lille) präsentieren.

Es war unglaublich spannend, das innovative Team und Ihr Labor zu sehen. Das Forscherteam ist bekannt für Ihre Arbeit, welche sich insbesondere mit der Interaktion von Menschen und Roboter auseinandersetzt. Dabei spielen Emotionen eine zentrale Rolle. Wir konnten einen spannenden Einblick in Ihre Arbeit erhalten. Noch spannender waren aber Ihre Inputs zu unseren Daten und den Austausch, wie wir die Messung bei Personen mit Parkinson optimieren und erweitern können.

An unserem dritten Tag in Lille, hat Dawn einem breiten Publikum unser Projekt im Detail vorgestellt. Es war deutlich Begeisterung in den Gesichtern zu erkennen und das Projekt ist auf grosses Interesse gestossen.

Wir freuen uns auf die weitere Zusammenarbeit mit dem gesamten Team in Lille und Euch neue Einblicke bald präsentieren zu können!

Autorin: Sabrina

Hallo liebe Forschungsfreunde, Interessierte und solche, die es gerne werden möchten!

Juhuu, es ist vollbracht! Der letzte der 15 Workshop fand gestern bei uns an der HSLU Musik statt und war ebenfalls ein voller Erfolg. Könnt ihr euch das vorstellen 15 Workshops? In den knapp sechs Monaten, die ich jetzt dabei bin, ist so einiges passiert und wir haben noch viel mehr geschafft. Vergesst  nicht die 20 Interviews mit den Workshopteilnehmern aller drei Standorte, die waren nämlich auch nicht ohne.

Aber das sollte jetzt nicht negativ klingen, denn die Arbeit macht mir wirklich sehr viel Spass und ich habe den Eindruck gewonnen, dass es den Teilnehmern ebenfalls viel Freude bereitet hat. Es war grossartig, dass alle Parkinsonbetroffenen, die bereits bei den Workshops im Juni dabei waren,  dieses Mal ebenfalls wieder mit von der Partie waren. Und wir haben sogar Zuwachs bekommen, denn Jane hat sich uns angeschlossen. Seit letztem Mittwoch befindet sie sich auf einem Schweiz-Trip und weil sie hervorragend Deutsch spricht, hat sie uns die Ehre ihrer Anwesenheit zu Teil werden lassen. Es war wunderbar, dass dadurch unsere Luzerner Teilnehmer einmal die Chance hatten mit einem unserer britischen Kollaboratoren zu sprechen.

Ich habe mich ausserdem bemüht, den Workshop im Vergleich zu den anderen beiden etwas aktiver zu gestalten und Übungen zur sowie mit der Musik anzuleiten, um tatsächlich auszutesten, was möglich ist und was nicht. Für Jane war es daher sicher auch spannend, den Workshop nochmals auf anderer Weise mitzumachen. Es wurde also wieder viel getanzt, u.a. Salsa, afrikanisch und Line Dance. Es war wirklich toll! 😀

Im Ansschluss an den Workshop gab es erneut ein gemeinsames Mittagessen, das sicher 1 1/2 Stunden gedauert hat, weil es soviel zu reden gab. Es war wirklich grossartig zu beobachten, wie die Teilnahmer sich über das Wiedersehen gefreut haben. Ich hoffe sehr, dass sie sich bei uns wohlgefühlt haben und ich freue mich schon auf weitere Zusammenarbeit.

Da jetzt die Datenerhebung der Konsultationsphase abgeschlossen ist, geht es nun ans Finalisieren des Kursprogramms. Zum Glück war das Feedback der meisten sehr positiv, sodass wir es nicht komplett umschreiben sondern nur an den Details feilschen müssen.

Also wünscht uns Glück und drückt die Daumen, dass die Ethikkommissionen genauso begeistert von dem Programm sein werden, wie unsere fleissigen Mitarbeiter aus England, Luzern und dem Tessin! 😉

Vielen Dank für das Lesen dieses Blogs und hinterlasst sehr gerne Kommentare. Ich kann es kaum erwarten, euch von all den weiteren spannenden Dingen und Erlebnissen zu berichten.

Liebe Grüsse und bis zum nächsten Lesen!

Ciao cari amici della scienza,  persona interessate e che vorrebbe esserlo!

Vergangenen Montag ging es für Dawn und mich wieder ins wunderschöne Tessin, um auch hier den fünften und finalen Workshop in der Clinica Hildebrand abzuhalten. Naja, also für Dawn ging es am Montag sehr früh los, denn ich bin bereits am Sonntag angereist und habe mir einen schönen Tag im sonnigen Brissago gemacht. Ach, es ist schon herrlich, so unter Palmen zu sein! 😀

Und auch die Fahrt über den Nufenen, der das Wallis mit dem Tessin verbindet, mangelte nicht an landschaftlichen Hinguckern:

Nun gut, soweit erstmal genug von meinen privaten Highlights, schliesslich war das ja eine Dienstreise und wir sind gekommen, um zu arbeiten 😉

Ebenso wie in England oder im Frühjahr im Tessin, war auch der finale Workshop in Brissago ein voller Erfolg und das lässt natürlich auch für den kommenden Workshop in Luzern hoffen. Paolo hat wieder einen grossartigen Job gemacht, indem er den Austausch über unser Kursprogramme stetig angeregt hat. Auch hier waren nicht nur die Parkinsonbetroffenen begeistert von dem Programm, sondern auch die Therapeuten, Daniele, Amanda und Daria, die Leiterin der Neurologie in der Klinik. Dawn und ich hatten auch grossen Spass dabei, eine kleine Line Dance Choreographie vorzuführen, die wir gerne den Teilnehmern unseres Kurses beibringen wollen. Ich hatte den Eindruck, dass diese sehr gut bei allen angekommen ist und am Ende gab es sogar Applaus!

Der einzige Wermutstropfen von Seiten der Parkinsonbetroffenen war, dass der Kurs in der Schweiz nicht vor 2024 starten würde und sie daher noch über ein Jahr warten müssen, um ihn ausprobieren zu dürfen. Aber wir haben ihnen versichert, dass es, auch wenn sie jetzt noch warten müssen, auf jeden Fall eine Möglichkeit der Teilnahme an dem Tessiner-Kurs für sie geben wird, wenn sie das möchten.

Nach Ende des Workshops sind Dawn und ich gemeinsam mit Paolo und Daniele Mittagessen gegangen, um den Erfolg des finialen Workshops zu feiern sowie das weitere Vorgehen zu besprechen. Es war ein herrlicher Tag und wir genossen das Geschäftsessen auf einer sonnigen Terrasse in Locarno. Wirklich ein gelungener Abschluss!

Grazie mille für das Lesen dieses Blogs und hinterlasst sehr gerne Kommentare. Ich kann es kaum erwarten, euch von all den weiteren spannenden Dingen und Erlebnissen zu berichten.

Ciao und bis zum nächsten Lesen!

Hello dear research friends, enthusiasts and those who would like to become one!

Dawn and I have been back in the UK to do the final workshop two weeks ago and the trip has been just as brilliant as the last one. It was so nice seeing all those great and lovely people again and working together on the programme for next year’s course. Once again, I can only say how much I’m looking forward to spending the next year  in the UK 🙂

The final workshop went really well and it was so great seeing that the people with Parkinson’s liked the programme we co-developed during spring time. Also, it was amazing that almost everybody had returned to join the workshop to give us their feedback. They were genuinely interessted it what we had done and I felt like they really appreciated to be treaten like the experts they are, and without their feedback it would be impossible to design the holistic programme we are aiming for.

Besides the work related stuff as well as meeting kind and lovely people, I had to do some very important PhD work at the UH like for example collecting my GO HERTS! hoodie.

And doesn’t it look great?! Thank you very much again, Dawn, for buying me the second purple hoodie from the sports village.

I also had to finish my Induction Checklist with my other supervisor Lucy, which meant meeting important and helpful people of the UH as well as geeting some adminstrational stuff done like collecting my UH member card. Dawn and Lucy gave me a tour on the campus and pointed out major buildings like the Science Building. It has been a lot of fun and I feel confident now to find my way on campus next year.

On the last day, we had a lovely lunch with Lucy and our collaborator Ruth at a pub called the crooked chimney. I guess you can see where the name comes from, can’t you? 😉

Thank you for reading this blog, and please feel free to leave some comments. I am very interested in your opinion. I can’t wait to keep you posted with all the exciting things going to happen.

Take care and see you for the next read!