With the theme "From Brain Research to Brain Repair", the conference aims to strengthen the bonds between basic neuroscientists and clinicians, and narrow the gap between basic neuroscience research and clinical application. 200 registered delegates are expected to attend the main symposium, with over 45 delegates from regional countries.

During this 2-day symposium, internationally renowned neuroscientists and local experts will cover important current topics in four main areas: Epilepsy and Cognition; Neurogenetics and Neurodegenerative Disorders; Ion Channel and Receptor Function; and Developmental Neurobiology and Neural Stem Cell.

Professor Nobuyukei Nukina, from RIKEN Brain Science Institute, Japan, will speak on molecular neuropathology of polyglutamine diseases, which cover several severe neurodegenerative disorders such as Huntington’s disease, dementia, SCA. His approach to understand the molecular basis of these diseases has led him to prepare a potential therapeutic strategy for these diseases.

The 3^rd SINC is also pleased to have A/P Steve Wilton, Head of the Experimental Molecular Medicine Group from the Australian Neuromuscular Research Institute in Australia, to share his research on Antisense technology, a potential approach for treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), the common form of muscular dystrophy in children that causes severe disability and death. He is preparing to conduct an international clinical trial using this strategy to treat DMD

Professor Hideyuki Okano, from Department of Physiology, Keio University, Japan, will talk on neural stem cells and their applications in treatment of spinal cord injury.

Professor Paul Chapman, Director and Head, Centre for Cognitive and Neurodegenerative Disorders, GlaxoSmithKline, Singapore, will describe the strategies for moving from animal models of AD to therapeutic strategies for both symptomatic treatment and disease modification in his talk – "Drug Discovery for Alzheimer's disease".

Dr Tang Feng Ru, the Organising Chairman of the 3^rd SINC, who is also the Principal Investigator at the NNI Epilepsy Research Laboratory, remarks, "As we all know, modern neuroscience research has made countless breakthroughs in the past 30 years. However, few of them could be translated to clinical treatment of neurological diseases, so as to significantly improve current therapies and effectively control main neurological disorders such as stroke, epilepsy, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s diseases and so on. The interaction of audiences from the local and foreign community of scientists and clinicians, junior and senior will surely generate exciting ideas and collaborations."

Other major research topics to be discussed at 3^rd SINC include:

• Rewiring of hippocampus at pan-brain level, a possible mechanism for epileptogenesis in the mouse model of human intractable epilepsy

New tracing and labelling methods have revolutionized neurobiology in the last 30 years. The basic purpose of neuronal tracing is to elucidate long range anatomical neuronal connections within the nervous system. For the first time, Dr Tang Feng Ru’s Epilepsy Research Lab at NNI has successfully injected different tracers into an epileptic mouse brain, in particularly hippocampus, which has shown dramatic changes of its afferent or efferent connections with medial septum and diagonal band of Broca, median raphe and supramammillary nuclei etc. These data are fundamental for understanding the mechanism of epileptogenesis, and may provide some clues for study in patients, so as to find certain key abnormal neural pathways for neurosurgical approach to cut them to cure, or to more effectively control intractable epilepsy. Dr Tang’s Ph.D student Zhang Si and Postdoctoral Fellow, Dr Ma Dong Liang will report their interesting findings that were also published in different top neuroscience journals.