LA TROBE UNIVERSITY

Bulletin

Promoting publicsector accountability

BulletinCHINESE archive project

LA TROBE & the Olympics

NEW WAYSof treating MS

JULY 2004

THE VICE-CHANCELLOR of La TrobeUniversity, Professor Michael Osborne,has signed a unique agreement for thepublication of the Chinese archive onSino-British Relations between 1862 and1911.

The agreement is between La Trobe,Peking University, and the First HistoricalArchive of China. It provides for thepublication of the key documents in thearchive in four volumes plus aninterpretative, historical study.

The records in question are stored in theArchive of the Forbidden City in Beijingand have not been available for studyhitherto. The agreement was signed on 15June, 2004, in the ceremonial hall ofPeking University.

Professor Osborne said that theagreement was a very exciting initiativewhich flowed from the close relationshipthat La Trobe had established with PekingUniversity, which is widely regarded asChina’s premier university.

‘The period in question is a particularlyinteresting one’, he said, ‘witnessing thedecline and fall of the Qing Dynasty andwidespread interference in China by thethen major powers, including Britain.’

There will be both English and Chineseversions of the five volumes. Thepublication committee will includerepresentatives from the three partiesinvolved. Professor Osborne will serve

along with distinguished historian,Professor Alan Frost and Dr Pei Likun,Head of the University’s China Office.

Professor Osborne said: ‘This project is asignificant one which will advance ourknowledge of a key period in Chinesehistory and illustrate in particular thepolicies and role of Britain in the Far East.’

Other volumes are planned to cover thediplomatic relations between China andFrance, Germany, Russia, the USA andJapan. �

NEWSLA TROBE UNIVERSITY

Bulletin

LA TROBE UNIVERSITY BULLET IN2

IN THIS ISSUE

The La Trobe Bulletin is published ten times a year by thePublic Affairs Office, La Trobe University.

Articles may be reproduced with acknowledgement.Photographs can be supplied.

Enquiries and submissions to the editor, Ernest Raetz,La Trobe University, Victoria. 3086 AustraliaTel (03) 9479 2315, Fax (03) 9479 1387Email: bulletin@latrobe.edu.au

Design: Campus Graphics, 58141La Trobe University.Printed by Print Management Group.Website: www.latrobe.edu.au/bulletin

Cover: La Trobe University haslaunched its new Public SectorGovernance and AccountabilityResearch Centre, see story page 6.

Photo courtesy of the Parliamentary

Library, Parliament of Victoria.

GRANTS SUCCESSBEATS NATIONALAVERAGELa Trobe University researchers –working towards solutions in key fieldsof community concern including aged-care, water management, forensicscience and grape production – havebeen allocated $1.13 million for sixprojects in the second round of theAustralian Research Council LinkageGrants. A further $1.22 million hascome from contributions by industrypartner. The projects have been fundedfor four years starting from this year.

Continued page 4

Agreement to publish unique Chinese archive 2

Grants success beats national average 2

Research suggests new ways of treating MS 3

Claude Bernard wins research medal 3

Grant to develop new malaria test 5

Launch of public sector research centre 6

Research in Action

‘Barcoding’ bloodworms to fight water pollution 7

Working towards a new class of insecticides 8

Research into face recognition 9

Massive task of indexing The Argus 10

Visual health in Alice Springs 11

More rural nurses and lung cancer nursing course 12

Physiotherapy students help at Paralympics 12

La Trobe honours Rhys Isaac 13

La Trobe and the Olympics

Second gold medal for Rachel? 14

Olympics – ancient and modern 14

Sporting Greek muse 15

Olympics and study – they can mix successfully 16

Agreement to publishunique Chinese archive

Photo top of page: Professor Osborne, centre,with Dr Xing Yongfu, Director, First Historical

Archive of China, left, and Professor Hao Ping,Vice-President, Peking University. Behind, fromleft, are Dr Zou Ai’Lian, Deputy Director, FirstHistorical Archive of China, and Dr Pei Likun,

Head of La Trobe’s China Office.

JULY 2004 3

RESEARCH NEWS

Eminent Australian neuroimmunologist, Professor Claude Bernard,left, has been awarded this year’s Bethlehem Griffiths ResearchFoundation Medal. Professor Bernard is Director of theNeuroimmunology Laboratory in the School of Molecular Sciencesat La Trobe University.

The award was presented in recognition of his outstandingcontribution to research into Multiple Sclerosis. Over the yearsProfessor Bernard and his colleagues have made excitingdiscoveries in this field of research, the latest published in theinternational science journal, Nature Neuroscience (see above).

In this, he and his colleagues have shown that targeting, byimmunisation, a specific molecule responsible for the failure of thecentral nervous system to regenerate in spinal cord injury and otherneurodegenerative disorders, can also blunt clinical signs and theprogression of multiple sclerosis in an experimental model of thedisease.

Claude Bernard wins researchfoundation medal

Continued page 4

Research suggests new ways of treating MS

Researchers from La TrobeUniversity have established a linkbetween a multiple sclerosis (MS)-like condition in mice and damage

to the nerves of the spinal cord. The workopens up a range of possibilities fortreating MS using a growing number ofnew techniques for repairing spinal cordinjury.

In a paper recently published in NatureNeuroscience, a team led by La TrobeResearch Fellow, Dr Tara Karnezis,showed that the onset of the MS-likecondition in mice can be significantlydelayed by inhibiting or removing aprotein which normally prevents spinalnerve regeneration. There is even asuggestion that the protein, known as NogoA, may have a hand in initiating MS.

‘The novelty of the work is that untilnow no one thought of applying theknowledge that has been gained from thehuge amount of recent work on spinal cordinjury to MS,’ said the Director of La Trobe’s Neuroimmunology Laboratoryin the School of Molecular Sciences,Professor Claude Bernard, who supervisedthe research project.

MS is a degenerative disease of the

nerves of the spinal cord and brain that,since the eradication of polio, has becomethe most common cause of paralysis inWestern countries. It generally strikespeople between the ages of 20 and 40 andis more common in women than men.

Until recently, MS was thought to besolely associated with inflammation of thefatty (myelin) sheath which surrounds thespinal nerves. Degeneration of this sheathresults in a misfiring of nerve impulsesalong the spinal cord. But, followingrecent work at La Trobe University and inthe US, an increasing number ofneuroscientists now believe MS alsoinvolves actual damage to the nervesthemselves. And Nogo A inhibitsregeneration of these nerves.

The researchers interfered with thefunctioning of Nogo A before inducing thecondition known as experimentalautoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) –used as a model of MS – in mice. In one setof experiments they vaccinated againstNogo A, by injecting an active section ofthe protein to prime the immune systemagainst it. The vaccination resulted in asignificant delay in the onset of EAE and areduction in the severity of its clinicalsymptoms. The team also worked at

triggering EAE in which the gene forproducing Nogo A was missing – withmuch the same outcome.

Nogo A is produced in the myelinsheath, but acts on the spinal nervesthemselves. It has been specificallyimplicated in preventing regeneration. Sothe research team’s results suggest that byneutralising Nogo A, damage to thesenerves has somehow been able to be

Continued page 4

Dr Karnezis in her laboratory.

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RESEARCH NEWS

4

Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), Professor Fred Smith, saidLa Trobe researchers scored a success rate of 54.5 per centcompared with the national average of 51.8 per cent in this round ofgrants.

In the Clinical Sciences, Professor Smith said, La Trobe wasfunded for a multidisciplinary project investigating the main factorsthat affect mobility, such as stair climbing and obstacle avoidance,in older adults including those affected by osteoarthritis.

The history of the Kew Residential Services, formerly know asKew Cottages, will trace the lives of its residents from 1887,analysing such things as changing politics and practices for peoplewith intellectual disabilities.

In the Horticulture category a project will explore how winegrapes can be grown with minimum use of pesticides and

fungicides. Two projects in the areaof Land, Parks and AgricultureManagement focus on issuesassociated with saline dry landmanagement and water useefficiency.

The introduction of DNA technology into forensic science hasrevolutionised this profession. A Law Enforcement project willdevelop modifications to current techniques and procedures, as wellas novel approaches, to improve the targeting, collection, extractionand typing of trace amounts of biological samples.

‘These are major projects that demonstrate La Trobe’s continuingcommitment to directing its research to the benefit of thecommunity,’ Professor Smith added. �

ARC grants success beats national averageContinued from page 2

Professor Smith: major projectsfor community benefit.

repaired or maybe even have beenprevented in the first place. Whatever thecase, the work points to a direct functionalconnection between EAE and spinal nervedamage.

Until now, much of the work linking MSwith nerve damage has been undertaken ontissue from human autopsies, ProfessorBernard said. The La Trobe research is thefirst to track the progress of the disease,and its association with nerve damage, inand experimental models of MS, thussupporting and extending the earlier USresearch.

‘This work is important because itsrelevance is not limited to neuro-degenerative diseases such as MS,’Professor Bernard said. ‘It also hassignificance for many other diseases of thecentral nervous system where nerves aredamaged or lost.’

And there is a potential clinical spinoff.Over the past decade there has been anupsurge in research into spinal cord injuryand its treatment, partly stimulated by theactivism of and surrounding the star of theSuperman films, Christopher Reeve, whowas left a quadriplegic by a horse ridingaccident in 1995. This work has thrown upseveral new leads for treating spinal injury,which now also may be worth

investigating for their relevance to MS.

Some of this research relates to usefuldrugs. There has been recent interest, forinstance, in the role of high concentrationsof the amino acid glutamate in damagingnerve cells. Researchers have been testingdrugs which counteract the impact ofglutamate, and have already shown theycan lessen paralysis and nerve damage inmice. There also have been positive stepsin using stem cells to regenerate spinalnerves.

The La Trobe group will be continuingits work investigating the possibilities ofcountering regeneration inhibitors likeNogo A, which may also produce usefultherapy in the long term. But theimmediate next step is to try and trackdown the site of any spinal cord injurycaused by EAE in mice.

Dr Karnezis is now working at StanfordUniversity in California. �

New ways of treating MS Continued from page 3

‘This suggests that blocking thisdeleterious molecule may help maintain orrestore the neuronal integrity of the centralnervous system in diseases like MS,’Professor Bernard said. He and hiscolleagues were among the first to focuson immune ‘T cells’ implicated in the

degeneration of myelin, the covering onnerve fibres, that were capable of routinelyinducing an MS-like disease in mice. Hewas also among the first to demonstratethat susceptibility to this MS-like disease,as well as immune responses to myelin, areunder genetic control.

More recently, he and his colleaguesidentified genetic factors on T cells that areassociated with the susceptibility of MS inhumans.

In association with colleagues atStanford and University of California, SanFrancisco, he has employed sophisticatedgene array analyses of MS tissues focusingon an immune-system protein known as‘osteopontin’. This protein appears to playa crucial role in the immune attack in MSand its progression, and thus may present atarget for future experimental therapies.

While Professor Bernard’s research hasprimarily concentrated on unravelling theinflammatory processes leading to MS, hehas also made major contributions to themore general fields of immunology,evolutionary genetics and neuroscience.

The Bethlehem Griffiths ResearchFoundation was established in 1994. It hascommitted approximately $2.2 million toresearch into palliative care andprogressive neurological diseases such asMultiple Sclerosis and Motor NeuroneDisease. �

Bernard wins researchfoundation medalContinued from page 3

La Trobe University and the

international diagnostics

company, PANBIO, have

received a Development

Grant from the National

Health & Medical Research

Council for malaria research.

The grant is to develop novel reagents todiagnose and differentiate the malariaparasites, Plasmodium falciparum andPlasmodium vivax. These reagents arebeing developed for potential use in rapidnew diagnostic tests, called ‘Point-of-Care’, one of the fastest growing areas ofmedical diagnostics in the world today.

PANBIO’s Point-of-Care (POC)diagnostic testing enables clinicians toperform rapid diagnostic assays, therebyincreasing the speed of diagnosis and thelevel of service to patients.

La Trobe Professor of Biochemistry,Leann Tilley, the Chief Investigator on theproject, said the research so far had led tothe discovery of proteins within the

malaria parasites, Plasmodium falciparumand Plasmodium vivax, that have potentialto allow the development of novel species-specific diagnostic reagents.

Professor Stuart Hazell, Vice-President,Research and Development at PANBIO,said PANBIO was pleased to be workingwith Dr Tilley on the project. ‘The abilityto quickly detect and differentiatePlasmodium falciparum and Plasmodiumvivax is an important challenge withinmedical diagnostics,’ he said.

‘We believe Professor Tilley and teammembers such as Dr Akin Adisa havemade a number of important discoveriesthat have the potential to be quicklytranslated into improved diagnosticassays.’

‘The $117,000 one-year grant will allowProfessor Tilley’s team to establish “proof-of-principle” in the application of thediscovery to diagnostic tests. Once thispotential has been established, PANBIOwill be looking to incorporate the reagentsinto a POC platform. This supports the on-going push by the company into the POCmarket,’ Professor Hazell said.

Malaria remains an important infectionaffecting millions of people each year. Ofthe four species of malaria parasites,Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodiumvivax have the greatest impact on humanhealth.

Plasmodium falciparum is the mostvirulent of the parasites and many strainsare highly resistant to the most commonlyused therapeutic agents. WhilePlasmodium falciparum is highly virulentit does not persist in the liver.

Plasmodium vivax is less virulent butpersists in the liver. Thus treatment ofPlasmodium vivax must have the ability tonot only kill parasites in the blood, butmust also clear the liver of infection. It ispossible to be infected with bothPlasmodium falciparum and Plasmodiumvivax.

A number of diagnostic tests can detectthe presence of unspecified Plasmodiumspecies or of Plasmodium falciparum inparticular, but a test that is positive formalaria parasites may indicate thepresence of any of the four species,including Plasmodium falciparum. Thesetests cannot determine if a person has a co-infection with Plasmodium falciparum andPlasmodium vivax, nor can they indicate aspecific infection with Plasmodium vivax.

Knowing the common antimicrobialresistance profiles within a region togetherwith an ability to rapidly detect infectionwith Plasmodium falciparum andPlasmodium vivax provides clinicians withimportant information enabling rapidtherapeutic intervention.

NHMRC Development Grants aredesigned to bring together universityresearchers and industry to ensure thealignment of research objectives with theneeds of the community and the market. �

RESEARCH NEWS

JULY 2004 5

Professor Tilley with PANBIO’s Professor Hazell, left, and the company’s CEO, Jim Porter.

GRANT TO DEVELOPNEW MALARIA TEST

Plasmodium falciparum parasites developing in human erythrocytes visualised

with fluorescent probes.

La Trobe University has established a new‘Public Sector Governance andAccountability Research Centre’ on itsmain Melbourne campus at Bundoora –with recently appointed Professor ofAccounting, Kerry Jacobs, as inauguralDirector.

The centre will serve as a strong base forindependent research, as well as trainingand support for members of PublicAccounts and similar committeesthroughout Australia, the Commonwealth,and countries in neighbouring regions.

Hailed as a ‘world first’ and launched ata ceremony in the Victorian ParliamentHouse in late June, organisers intend thenew Public Sector Governance andAccountability Research Centre(PSGARC) to be replicated elsewhere,creating ultimately a global network ofindependent academic research bodiesworking on issues of public accountability.

Launching the centre, Mr Peter LoneyMP said accountability wasnow one of the mostcommon topics in anydiscussion aboutgovernment and itsrelationship with itscitizens.

Mr Loney is DeputySpeaker of the VictorianParliament and Chairmanof the Australasian Councilof Public AccountsCommittees Conference(ACPAC) held inMelbourne last year, whichcalled for the establishmentof such a centre.

‘The public has becomeincreasingly concernedabout the consequences of badgovernance,’ Mr Loney said. ‘At first thisconcern centred on the inadequacies ofcorporate governance following somespectacular collapses – Enron in the USand HIH in Australia are just two examples– but greater emphasis is now being

placed on governance and accountabilitywithin the public sector.

‘Public accountability is, and must be, ofa higher standard than that applied tocorporations.’

Professor Jacobs said the La TrobeUniversity Public Sector Governance andAccountability Research Centre wassignificantly different from other suchcentres.

‘It is not just an academic exercise, but asynthesis of academic and practicalconcerns. We have responded directly tothe expressed needs of the Parliamentarymembers of Public Accounts Committees –a need which has been emphasised by boththe World Bank and the CommonwealthParliamentary Association.

‘By taking such a practical stance theresearch centre will contribute to ourknowledge of public sector accountabilityand governance and will lead to real

change in the quality of parliamentarygovernance in and beyond Australia.’

Professor Jacobs said one of the firstresearch projects of the Centre will be tocollect and analyse performance andpractice data from every Australian PublicAccounts Committee.

The Centre will liaise closely withinternational agencies, especially theCommonwealth Parliamentary Association,the World Bank Institute and theInternational Organisation of SupremeAudit Institutions.

It will promote research, teaching andpractice that contributes to accountability,openness and transparency of governmentsand conduct seminars and trainingworkshops for the members and staff ofPACs, and especially for those ofAustralia, New Zealand and the Asia-Pacific region.

Mr Loney said the ACPAC conference –which called for the establishment of sucha centre – drew delegations, includingAuditors General from many AustralianStates and Territories, the Commonwealth,New Zealand, New Guinea, East Timor,Singapore, Canada, Newfoundland andLabrador, South Africa, Ireland, Zambia,and Namibia.

Mr Loney, working withLa Trobe Visiting HonoraryFellow in Law andManagement, Dr Bill Stent,and Professor Jacobs,developed the proposal thathas now led to theestablishment of the La Trobe centre. Theconcept was supported byProfessor Greg O’Brien,recently retired Dean of theFaculty of Law andManagement, Head ofGlobal Business Law,Professor Gordon Walker,and Professor Imad Moosa,Head of Economics andFinance.

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COMMUNITY

6

Launch of public sectorresearch centre

Continued page 11

At the launch in Parliament House, front rowfrom left, Professors Walker, O’Brien, and Jacobswith, at rear, Mr Loney MP, second from left, and

Dr Bill Stent. They are flanked by former VictorianLabor Premier, John Cain, right, and former State

Treasurer, Tony Sheehan, left, who is also amember of the University Council.

JULY 2004 7

RESEARCH IN ACTION

La Trobe researchers are developing DNAtechniques to help Melbourne Water assesshow effectively it cleans up pollutedcreeks.

The work focuses on bloodworms, thelarvae of a highly diverse group of non-biting midges known as chironomids,which occur all over the world. In Europeand North America they are used asindicators of the health of waterways.

‘Chironomids live throughout theirlarval stages in sediments, and aretherefore closely associated with any sortof pollutant or toxicant that might be in thesediment or the overlying water,’ says DrYvonne Parsons of the University’s Centrefor Environmental Stress and AdaptationResearch (CESAR).

Different species of bloodworms aresusceptible to different levels of pollutants,so the array of species present in an areaprovides an indication of which pollutantsare there, and at what concentrations.

‘But the differences between individualspecies can be very, very minute,’ says DrParsons. ‘And it takes a lot of expertise tobe able to identify them.’

So her research team has taken amolecular approach – the first time this hasbeen done worldwide – to distinguishbetween the nine southeast Australianspecies of the genus Chironomus. Theresearchers have concentrated on aparticular region of the gene for theenzyme Cyctochrome Oxidase 1.

This region, which diverges rapidlybetween species, is increasingly being usedfor classification purposes. In fact, someresearchers in Canada now refer to it as‘the barcode of life’. The DNAidentification of bloodworms is working‘very nicely’, Dr Parsons says.

In collaboration with Melbourne Waterscientist, Vin Pettigrove, the researchershope to develop ways of using bloodwormdiversity to determine the impact of watermanagement practices.

‘One of the big problems of remediationof polluted areas is that the managementauthorities do not have a very good senseof what particular action is going to bemost beneficial,’ Dr Parsons says.‘Bloodworms and other bio-indicatorspecies enable us to get a handle on theeffect pollutants are having on actual lifeforms. You can have a high concentration

of a particular heavy metal in the sediment,for instance, but it might not be havingmuch impact because it is in a form whichis non-toxic.’

Dr Parsons, however, wants to gofurther. She is working with geneticist DrJon Martin of Melbourne University toidentify the genes associated withpollution tolerance in the chironomids. Thepair think they may then be able to developan assay of the activity of particular geneswhich will indicate which pollutants arepresent and their impact.

‘If a particular pollutant has a negativeeffect, certain genes should be expressedmore heavily to try to reduce that effect,’Dr Parsons says. Research by PhD studentJacqueline Ward indicates that localadaptation to pollution occurs in somechironomid species and gene expression inthese populations can be tested.

But that’s not all. Dr Parsons thinks thatthese negative effects should be felt soonerby microbes than by insects. So she is alsoworking with microbial geneticistAssociate Professor Harold Stokes ofMacquarie University investigating thegenes which confer heavy metal tolerancein micro-organisms. �

‘BARCODING’bloodworms to fight water pollution

Acollaboration between researchersfrom La Trobe University and theUniversity of Queensland couldlead to a whole new class of

insecticides.

The work focuses on small, cyclicproteins known as cyclotides. Originallyextracted from the leaves of a weedy teaplant from central Africa, these unusualcompounds have now been found in manywidely differing groups of plants,including native Australian violets. Butuntil recently, the function of thecyclotides was something of a mystery.

‘We decided to feed cyclotides tocaterpillars,’ says Professor MarilynAnderson of the Department ofBiochemistry. ‘We thought anythingproduced in such abundance in leaves –where you get 20 to 30 different typesproduced by one plant – probably hadsomething to do with plant defence.’

Professor Anderson turned out to bedead right. As it happened, she and herteam already had a stock of caterpillarsthey could use. They were of an importantpest of cotton and corn, the moth speciesHelicoverpa puntigera. When fed a dietcontaining cyclotides, the insects did notgrow, and nearly half of them died within afortnight of hatching.

‘In fact, the first feeding trials wereaborted because the caterpillars keptescaping when exposed to the cyclotidediets. While those fed on a normal dietwould just sit there and eat contentedly, thetest animals did all sorts of things to getout.’ As a follow-up, the La Troberesearchers are now involved in a series ofstudies probing just how the cyclotidesaffect insects, and how and where they are

made andstored in theleaves ofplants.

Cyclotidesfirst came tonotice whenLorents Gran,a Norwegiand o c t o r

working with the Red Cross in the Congoin the 1960s, observed a tendency of thecontractions of women in labour toaccelerate just after they were visited byrelatives. He soon tracked down the cause– a traditional medicinal tea brewed fromthe leaves of a local weedy plant smuggledinto the hospital.

On his return to Norway, Gran extractedthe active ingredient from the tea. He foundit was a small protein, but was unable tounscramble its three-dimensional structure.That did not happen for another 20 years,when Professor David Craik, now of theInstitute for Molecular Bioscience at theUniversity of Queensland, began usingnuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) atOxford University to solve the structures ofthese unique proteins.

When he looked at the first cyclotides,Professor Craik found something sounusual he could hardly believe it. He onlyfelt confident enough to publish thestructure a couple of years later. It was aring of about 30 amino acids – the buildingblocks of protein – but across the middlewere three cross linkages between sulphuratoms, which produced a pretzel-shapedknot. He named these compoundscyclotides after discovering many moreexamples in plants other than just theAfrican weed.

The compounds have since become ahotbed of research because, not only is thecyclotide structure small for a protein, it isalso exceptionally stable. Unlike almost allother proteins, for instance, it resists

boiling as well as exposure to acids andorganic solvents. In fact, it is so stable, thathe reasoned it might be able to passthrough the digestive system without beingbroken down, and yet it is so small, itshould be able to be absorbed easily.

Such a molecule, Professor Craikargued, could form a useful platform fororal drug delivery. And having determinedhow to make cyclotides synthetically, heand his group at the University ofQueensland are now working on this verypossibility.

The La Trobe group became involvedwhen Professor Craik and ProfessorAnderson, with whom he was working onanother project, began to talk about whatthe compound actually did in plants in thefirst place. The very properties that makecyclotides useful for drug delivery,however, also make them very difficult towork with. They are tiny and they aresoluble in water, organic solvents and acidsso they are often difficult to detect.

Research assistant, Barbara Barbeta isobserving the guts of insects under themicroscope to see what happens aftercyclotides have been consumed. In order todetermine the impact of cyclotides, Ms

LA TROBE UNIVERSITY BULLET IN8

RESEARCH IN ACTION

Working towaa new class of insect

Barbeta has to understand what a normalcaterpillar gut looks like. ‘There’s not a lotof work been done on this,’ says ProfessorAnderson, ‘even though we are usingsome of the worst insect pests of cotton inthe world – major pests that we spendbillions of dollars on controlling.’

Because such work demands highlyspecialised methods and equipment theresearch groups in Brisbane andMelbourne have taken to pooling theirknowledge and resources. Postgraduatestudents working on cyclotides tend to bejointly supervised by Professor Craik andProfessor Anderson, and often shuttlebetween the two laboratories.

For instance, while the chemical workon the structure of the cyclotides is thepreserve of the Queensland team, there is

an overlap withthe studies ofProfessor Ander-son’s group onjust how themolecules areproduced andfunction in biolo-gical systems.

It was a formerp o s t g r a d u a t e

member of Professor Anderson’s team,Cameron Jennings, who first showed thatthe cyclotide molecule is formed as a unit,the product of a single gene. This protein isthen processed and folded in the cellularmembranes, known as the endoplasmicreticulum and the Golgi apparatus. But justhow that occurs, and even where themolecule ends up, are still unansweredquestions. And the process may be differentin different plants, even though the actualend product itself is exactly the same.

In order to study just how the compoundis made, Professor Anderson’s group ismaking a series of transgenic plantsincorporating different mutants of thecyclotide gene, and observing how theyare expressed. ‘We want to see whataffects the assembly process.’

But the Australians are not the only onesworking on cyclotides. Already, saysProfessor Anderson, a company has beenestablished in Germany to producecyclotides on a large scale, and companiesin the US are also taking interest. ‘We oncehad the whole area to ourselves, now wehave some competition to keep us on ourtoes.’ �

L a Trobe University eye researcher, DrAdrian Dyer, after a series of

innovative experiments, can help tell ushow we learn to recognise a face. He hasconcluded that there is a template in ourbrain that enables us to imprint a face inour memory.

His experiments with students at La Trobe over the past two years haveturned up new evidence that lead him tothis conclusion. They have also stronglyindicated that when looking at a face, ourgaze tends to strongly concentrate on theeyes of that face and this helps therecognition process.

A post doctoral Research Fellow in the School of Orthoptics, Dr Dyer isinvestigating the role of eye movements inthe perception and recognition of faces.

Dr Dyer said that before you canrecognise a face, you have to ‘learn’ thatface – have it implanted in a template.‘Once we build up the template, webecome really good at recognising faces.’

To understand why humans are so goodat recognising faces, he said it was firstnecessary to understand the process bywhich we ‘learn’ faces because we cannotrecognise faces that we have not ‘learned’.

The first experiments were designed tohelp him understand the learning process.

These were fol-lowed by othersdesigned to throwlight on the subsequent recognitionprocess.

To discover how long it took people to‘learn’ a face, Dr Dyer recruited La Trobestudent volunteers and subjected them to aseries of tests. In the first test, each studentviewed a computer monitor and a facewould appear.

The students looked at the face for aslong as they liked and then pushed a buttonto indicate that they thought they couldrecognise the face if they saw it again.Another face then appeared and theprocess was repeated a number of times.On average the students allowedthemselves about five seconds to feel theywould know the face again.

Students were shown a second series offaces and asked to indicate whether theywere among those previously shown. Withan average response time of only 1.5seconds, the students responded theoriginal faces with 93 per cent accuracy. Inanother experiment, students viewedfamous faces presented for a short periodof time on the screen. The students wereable to identify a person after viewing aface for less than one twentieth of asecond.

JULY 2004 9

RESEARCH IN ACTION

I KNOW THAT FACE! The eyes have it whenit comes to recognition

Continued page 11

ards ticides

From right, Professor Anderson with researchassistants, Rosemary Renda, Ms Barbeta, andPhD student Amanda Gillon.

It’s probably the longest-runningresearch project in which La TrobeUniversity has participated andpossibly the longest for any Australian

University. It began in 1984 and with luckshould be finished in 2010.

‘I hope I am still around to see itthrough,’ says La Trobe History ProgramReader, Dr John Hirst, who is directing themammoth task of indexing The Argusnewspaper published in Melbourne from1846 to 1955.

With a team of about 40 people, Dr Hirstis supervising the compilation of an indexof the news content of the paper from 1860to 1909.

He has four paid researchers plus morethan 25 volunteer readers who read either

microfiche or hard copies of The Argus.The senior researcher is Ms GeraldineSuter of La Trobe’s History Program.There are other paid researchers atMelbourne, Monash, Griffith universitiesand the Australian National University, aswell as volunteers.

The La Trobe-led indexing project, incollaboration with several universities andother organisations, is filling a 50 year gapbetween two Argus indexes. One index ofthe news contents of The Argus between1846 and 1859 was compiled in the 1940sand 1950s by retired state librarian JohnFreely. Another index, from 1910 until thepaper changed format from old fashionedbroadsheet to slick tabloid in the 1940s,was compiled by the paper itself.

‘Which left the half century gap between1860 and 1909, a very important period inVictoria’s history, that needed to be filledin order to give historians, heritageresearchers, architects, engineers andmany other people a ready reference to theevents the paper chronicled,’ says Dr Hirst.

What did The Argus say about thebushranging activities, trial and executionof Ned Kelly, the building and opening ofthe Exhibition Building, and many otherevents, famous or obscure, that contributedto the history of Australia?

‘Current newspaper items provideinsights to major events,’ Dr Hirst said.‘For example there is a news story in TheArgus about a man pretending to be Neddemanding free drinks in a pub andanother about a bank manager who killedhimself with a pistol issued to him toprotect him from the Kelly Gang.

‘The only way researchers can gatherthis information without expendingenormous amounts of time is to have anaccurately compiled index,’ says Dr Hirstwho first became involved in 1984 whenthe Victorian Government providedfinance as part of its program to celebratethe State’s sesquicentenary.

‘It is a huge job. In 1999 we publishedfive large volumes of index for the 1860s,taking two years per volume. We have nowcompleted the 1870s with the assistance ofa $300,000 ARC infrastructure grant.These volumes are currently in the finalstages of editing and will be published on-line in collaboration with the NationalLibrary of Australia in Canberra which hasbecome a partner in the project.

‘We began work this year on the 1880s,also with grants of $300,000 from theARC. If we continue to receive sufficientgrants, we would expect to finish the entireproject by 2009 or 2010.

‘When the index is completed, Australiawill have an equivalent resource to TheTimes Index in Britain or The New YorkTimes Index in the US,’ says Dr Hirst. �

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RESEARCH IN ACTION

CHRONICLING OUR PAST

The massive task of indexing The Argus

Photo top of page: Dr Hirst, left, with two of his forty ‘readers’, Jeremy Sammut and

Suzanne Foley.

Launch of public sectorresearch centreContinued from page 6

L a Trobe University final year orthopticsstudent, Maria Kolic, believes her

clinical experience in Alice Springs mayhave changed her entire career outlook.

After three weeks at the Alice SpringsHospital Eye Clinic, she believes helpingalleviate eye problems of the Aboriginalpopulation may become a significant partof her professional life.

Her stay in Central Australia was aroutine third-year clinical placement – butits effect on her, both professionally andpersonally, was anything but routine.

‘Like many Australians, particularly thechildren of migrants, I was unaware of atotally different Australia in the outbackand the effects of cultural differencesbetween indigenous and other Australiansin relation to many things, particularlyhealth care,’ she says.

Ms Kolic described her experiencesrecently at the Orthoptic ClinicalEducation Conference.

‘I also found that there were cultural andlanguage barriers to the efficientadministration of health care. I came awayconvinced that despite the dedicated workbeing done in Aboriginal health care, much

research was required into Aboriginalperceptions of, and compliance with,health care initiatives.’

At the Eye Clinic she worked withindigenous and non-indigenous staff todetect and treat diabetic retinopathy, acondition where changes to blood vesselsin the retina at the back of the eye can leadto irreversible reduction in vision.

It is a widespread problem around AliceSprings where between 20 and 50 per centof the indigenous population has diabetes.Its prevalence is much higher and it has anearlier onset than among non-indigenousAustralians. Studies on diabeticretinopathy in indigenous communitiespoint to between 21 and 31 per cent ofdiabetics having the condition.

Ms Kolic said that treatment was bylaser, but the procedure often had adverseeffects. The real answer was prevention,which meant patients must control theirblood sugar levels.

‘This is where culture and languageenters the equation because they involveAboriginal values, customs andcomprehension of a wide range of aspects,including that of correct diets andhygiene,’ she said. �

‘We know that it is not possible to movethe eye to multiple positions in onetwentieth of a second, so we concludedthat the eye does not have to move torecognise a face, even if the face is rotated.This indicates strongly that we use a lowresolution eidetic – a photographicmemory – to recognise a face.

‘In another experiment, 25 studentswere shown a vertical half of a face with ablank space where the other half shouldhave been. Sixty four per cent of thestudents looked at the blank space whichstrongly suggests they were influenced todo so by a top down model of processingfaces in their brain.

‘Another experiment strengthened thetemplate hypothesis. Students were showna series of pictures each depicting a seriesof simple line drawings including two

circles which changed position insequence until they formed a face. Thestudents paid no attention to the circlesuntil they finally became eyes in the finalimage.

‘In further tests, students looked at facesbroken up into 10 components – forehead,eyes, ears, nose, cheeks, mouth and chin –and we did a recognition test mapping theareas of the face they looked at.

‘Those poor at recognising faces spentrelatively more time looking at the mouthand lower parts of the face. Those whoscored highly spent more time looking atthe eyes, although they also looked at allother facial components.

‘This indicates that eyes are criticallyimportant in the task of learning andsubsequently recognising faces. We hadsuspected this because previous eyemovement recordings even from youngbabies showed that a lot of attention is paidto the eyes.’ �

NEWS

JULY 2004 11

I KNOW THAT FACE!Continued from page 9

VISUAL HEALTH INALICE SPRINGS

The Directors of PSGARC are theCentre’s Head, Professor Kerry Jacobs,above, who was previously employed bythe University of Edinburgh and remainsan Associate Fellow of the Institute ofPublic Sector Accounting Research basedat Edinburgh. He is a Fellow of CPAAustralia.

Deputy Director of the Centre is DrEwen Michael, co-ordinator of economicand policy studies in Tourism andHospitality at La Trobe. He has worked asan economic policy analyst and projectleader for the Australian Railway Researchand Development Organisation Ltd.

The PSGARC Advisory Boardcomprises: Professor Max Aiken,Emeritus Professor of Accounting, La Trobe University; Mr Bruce Bennett,UNITEC Institute of Technology,Auckland New Zealand; Mr ClaytonCosgrove MP (NZ), Chairman Financeand Expenditure Select Committee; MrPeter Loney MP, Deputy SpeakerVictorian Legislative Assembly andImmediate Past-Chairman of theAustralasian Council of Public AccountsCommittees; Rt Hon. Mike Moore, formerPrime Minister of NZ and DirectorGeneral of the World Trade Organisation,now La Trobe University AdjunctProfessor in Law and Management; Hon.Tony Sheehan, Member of La TrobeUniversity Council and former Treasurerof the State of Victoria. �

New course for lungcancer nursing

L a Trobe University’s Austin Health Clinical School of Nursing,Austin Health and the Cancer Council Victoria have developed

a new initiative to train nurses with specialist skills in caring forlung cancer patients. The program helps Registered Nurses(Division 1) increase their knowledge and skills so they canimprove the quality of life for these patients.

Nurses, doctors and allied health professionals specialising inlung cancer care wrote the training package for the 13 weekdistance education program. Students study off campus throughstudy guides, selected readings and supporting activities whichintegrate theory with practice. The subject can be accreditedtowards a Graduate Diploma in Cancer Care or Palliative Care.

Professor of Nursing, Annette Street, said: ‘Unlike breast cancer,lung cancer does not have a high profile in the Australiancommunity or the media, yet it kills more Australians each yearthan any other cancer. In most cases it is a preventable disease with90% of cases attributed to smoking. It is also the most difficultcancer to diagnose and the most complex cancer to manage.’ �

I n a ‘first’ for multi-mode nursingeducation in Victorian designed to boost

nursing numbers in rural areas, 26 studentshave graduated from La Trobe University’sMildura Campus.

Course convenor and senior lecturer inNursing and Midwifery, Dr Susan Koch,says most of the graduates are nowworking in regional areas, providingwelcome interim relief to the chronicshortage of qualified Division 1 nurses inrural health agencies.

The innovative course enabled selectedMildura Bachelor of Nursing students tocomplete a large part of their studieswithout having to leave their homes andplaces of work.

The course was supported by fundingfrom the Department of Human Servicesand accredited by the Nurses Board of Victoria for five years to allowregistered nurses (Division 2) to upgradetheir qualifications to registered nurse(Division 1).

It was developed following anapproached from the Mildura BaseHospital. Two cohorts of studentscompleted the course between 2001 and2003. The first undertook the program over

two and a half years, while the secondwent through a two-year acceleratedprogram.

Dr Koch says the course was held withtechnical support from Sunraysia Instituteof TAFE, with the main clinical support inacute nursing provided by the MilduraBase Hospital.

Multi-mode learning involves the use oflearning packages that include referencematerials, assessment details and guidelinesfor presentation. Face-to-face teaching isalso provided for three days by academicstaff from La Trobe’s Bundoora andBendigo campuses and by Mildura campusclinical staff. �

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HEALTH

12

Physio students helpat Paralympics I t’s a busy year for La Trobe University Master of Physiotherapy

student, Jenni Barron. Not only will she finish her degree in La Trobe’s School of Physiotherapy and begin teaching second yearBachelor of Physiotherapy students in orthopaedics – but she willalso play an important role at the Paralympics in Athens inSeptember.

Ms Barron is Deputy Medical Officer and Chair of the Asia-Oceania Zone of the World Organisation of Volleyball for Disabledand one of the Organisation’s international classifiers. As aninternational classifier, Ms Barron – who also holds a Mastersdegree in Health Science (Education) – will assess the level ofdisability of athletes competing in volleyball at the Paralympics, arole she also performed during the Sydney 2000 Paralympic Games.

She has considerable experience in the Paralympic Games.Employed by the Sydney Paralympic Organising Committee sheworked within the SOCOG Medical Program at Games HQ for the2000 Olympics as the medical coordinator for the ParalympicGames.

Another member of the La Trobe University community playinga role in Athens will be PhD candidate, Mr Gavin Williams. Hisrole for the Paralympics is to assist in a process that will change theway athletes are classified for competition.

A physiotherapist in the Brain Injury Unit at Epworth Hospital,his area of interest is retraining walking, running and return to sportfollowing traumatic brain injury. His PhD research is on thedevelopment of a high-level mobility scale for TBI called theHiMAT. �

See ‘La Trobe and the Olympics’ starting page 14.

GRADUATES PROVIDEMORE RURAL NURSES

JULY 2004 13

‘Stories are history’s theatre. The trick is totell them well, to hear the different voices,to see the agency they portray, to catch thefreedoms they indicate. Above all, whenthe power is so violent and all pervasiveand so de-humanising, the trick is to findthe humanity – in the pain, in the laughter,in the dignity, in the trickster plays of thesuppressed.’

Those words were among many tributeswhen La Trobe University held a specialsymposium to honour one if its mostdistinguished scholars, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, Rhys Isaac.

They came from another celebratedhistorian and author, Greg Dening. At thesymposium Professor Dening launched –or ‘opened’ – Emeritus Professor Isaac’slatest book, Landon Carter’s UneasyKingdom.

The book has already been selected bythe 20,000 member US ‘History Book ofthe Month Club’, guaranteeing it a hugereadership.

For Professor Isaac, the book launch andsymposium celebrated a career crowned bywinning the Pulitzer Prize in 1983 for hisbook, The Transformation of Virginia,making him the only non-American toreceive this honour.

At the symposium,held on theUniversity’s mainMelbourne campus atBundoora in lateJune, ten leadingscholars presentedtheir own work –ranging fromwitchcraft inseventeenth centuryFrance to womenworkers in Victoria’srural north-east.

Professor Isaac,who has specialisedin studying theAmerican revolution,has held many visitingappointments atdistinguished American institutions such asPrinceton and the Smithsonian, often forextensive periods. But he is adamant La Trobe University launched and sustainedhim.

His new book is based on more than ahundred diaries written over twenty yearsby Landon Carter, an ‘angry observer andparticipant’ plantation owner who lived inRichmond County, Virginia, during theAmerican Revolution.

Reviews have described it as a‘poignant’ document on the ‘collapse of anold world, mixed with learned commentary– an outstanding work of history’.

Professor Dening said Professor Isaac’sbook described the American Revolution‘at the ground level, away from the drama,out of hearing of all the speeches’. It made‘windows where there were once walls.’

‘American readers will see their slavepast and all that it means in a new light.Master and slave are bound together inways that neither can change,’ he added.

Historians like Rhys Isaac ‘write not forthe dead, though we respect them,’Professor Dening concluded. ‘We write forthe living in the hope that they will in someway change the world we live in.’ �

JM Coetzeebook reading in AugustNobel Laureate and two time Booker Prizewinning author, J.M. Coetzee will readfrom his works at 6 pm, on WednesdayAugust 4 in the Melbourne Town Hall, aspart of the ‘Melbourne Conversations’series.

The series is presented by La TrobeUniversity, the City of Melbourne, theAustralian Book Review and ReadingsBooks and Music.

Tickets are free and available from allReadings stores, or send a stamped self-addressed envelope to 309 Lygon StCarlton 3053. �

MAKING WINDOWSWHERE THERE ONCEWERE WALLS

La TrobehonoursPulitzerPrize-winninghistorian

PEOPLE

open day04Sundays in August1300 135 045

LA TROBE UNIVERSITY BULLET IN

LA TROBE AND THE OLYMPICS

14

Winners are heroes, feted byadoring fans and proudgovernments, often usingtheir short-lived sporting

prowess to achieve wealth and prestige foran entire lifetime.

Sounds like the future facing victors atthe Athens Olympics!

‘Indeed it is – and so it was for themillennium that the ancient Olympicswere held. In this aspect, little has changedsince the first Olympics in 776 BC,’ saysclassical archaeologist, Dr ElizabethPemberton.

Now an Honorary Research Associate inLa Trobe University’s ArchaeologyProgram, Dr Pemberton has researchedboth archaeological and historical aspectsof the Olympics and lesser games inancient Greece. She is particularlyintrigued by the differences between theancient and modern games.

The fame of victors is one of the greatsimilarities. Almost from the start until theGames finally ceased in the fourth centuryAD, Olympic victors – even those frompoor backgrounds – found that many doorsopened for them.

‘At the time of their victory theyreceived little, merely an olive victorywreath and religious privileges. But thereare many examples over that millenniumof victors using their fame for political,financial and other ends. Some cities gavelocal victors free food for life. Manywinners used their popularity to gainelection to political office,’ Dr Pembertonsaid.

There is very detailed information aboutthis and other aspects of the ancientOlympic Games, both from archaeologyand written records of historians of thetime.

The Games were held at Olympia on afertile flat plain – one of the few in Greece– flanked by the Alpheios and Kladeosrivers about 56 km from the city of Eliswhere athletes and officials gathered.Importantly, the Olympia site providedgrazing for horses used in chariot races.

For a month officials watched theathletes train, making sure they reached asufficient level of prowess before allowingthem to compete. Then both athletes andofficials marched the 56 km to Olympia inone day – another test of fitness.

Olympics – ancient and THE SAME, ONLY

A secondgold medalfor Rachel?La Trobe University fourth year Bachelorof Prosthetics and Orthotics student,Rachel Imison, is aiming for her secondOlympic Gold Medal in Athens.

Rachel is goalkeeper in the AustralianWomen’s Hockey team which hopes torepeat in Athens its Gold Medalperformance at the 2000 Games inSydney.

A member of the Hawthorn HockeyClub, Ms Imison plays for the VIS Vipersin the Australian National League.

She first came to internationalprominence when declared goalkeeper ofthe tournament at the Junior World Cup in1997 in Korea and has since played inmore than 100 internationals.

Apart from her Gold Medal at theSydney Olympics, her career highlightshave included participation in the WorldCup (Perth, 2002) Champions Trophyevents in Sydney (2003), Amsterdam(2001), Amstelveen (2000), Brisbane(1999) and Berlin (1997) and

Commonwealth Gamesin Manchester (2002)and Kuala Lumpur(1998).

Ms Imison has comeinto prominence notonly as a hockey playerbut also as a student.She has been awardedthe InternationalSociety of Prosthetics

and Orthotics Prize as the mostoutstanding La Trobe third year P&Ostudent for 2003.

A year previously she featured in anarticle in The Age Education Section inwhich she described her life as a P&Ostudent – without mentioning her ‘otherlife’ as an international hockey star.

She has been awarded the OAM forservices to sport. �

Because the Games lasted only five daysand were held only every four years, thereis an excellent archaeological record. Mostathletes, officials, and the thousands ofspectators brought their own food andutensils for cooking and water and lived intents, digging temporary wells for water.When the five day program was over, thosecleaning up the site simply dumped thepottery and other debris into the wells asnew ones would be dug for the next games.

The increasing popularity of the Gamesover the centuries can be gauged by therise in the number of wells dug and thenumber of permanent buildings erected.

T emples, altars and treasuries wereamong the earlier buildings. Then the

Romans came and added baths and morebuildings, but under Roman rule theGames were less prestigious than when theGreeks were independent.

Excavations at Olympia started brieflywith the French in the 1820s. They wentaway and the Germans came in 1875 andin seven or eight years uncovered massiveamounts of material from the wells andfound the many building foundations.There was a hiatus until 1936 when thegovernment of Nazi Germany financed the

continuation of the German excavation.The Germans have had exclusiveexcavation rights to the site ever since andare still making very significantdiscoveries there.

There are also extremely good writtenrecords of the games and the names ofmany of the winners – even the winner ofthe only event in 776 BC – are known. Hewas Coroebus from Elis, victor in the 192metre sprint. Records of the winners ofmany events are preserved right down tothe third century AD.

The Greek traveller and historian,Pausanias, visited Olympia in the secondcentury AD and wrote detailed accounts ofindividual athletes which he learned fromguides and local records. Earlier historiansand poets also wrote about the games.

The ancient games differed from themodern in several ways, primarily becausethey were part of a religious festival, withevent winners granted the privilege oflighting the altar for the great sacrifice.And they were by no means international,with only Greek-born males permitted toparticipate in the earlier games.

Another difference was the Sacred Truceduring the games. Heralds weredespatched to Greek cities to proclaim thatthe games would be held at a certain time.Wars did not stop, but people going to theGames could pass safely through areas ofconflict. All events were individual. Therewere no team games.

‘Like today, the games caused enormousinterest and rivalry between individualparticipants and their places of origin. Inthis way, they affect us in the same waythey affected our forebears,’ Dr Pembertonadded. �

La Trobe’s Greek Studies Program has hadno athletes participating in the Olympicssince the ultra-marathon runner, YiannisKouros, graduated several years ago.

But it has made a contribution to the‘Cultural Olympics’ by organising theFourth Annual La Trobe Greek PoetryEvening devoted to ‘The Sporting GreekMuse’.

Held in the run-up to the Olympics andsponsored the Greek Ministry of Culture –which has responsibility for Athens 2004 –the evening featured presentations bystaff, associates and friends of the GreekStudies Program on Greek poets fromHomer to Trypanis writing about sportsranging from athletics to jousting.

Presentations by La Trobe academicstaff members included Modern GreekSporting Muse by the Head of HellenicStudies, Professor Stathis Gauntlett:Odysseus the Athlete by School of Arts andEntertainment lecturer, Dr Roger Sworder;and Sportsmanship in Renaissance Creteby honorary research associate in theArchaeology Program Dr ElizabethPemberton, see main story, left. �

LA TROBE AND THE OLYMPICS

JULY 2004 15

SPORTINGGREEK MUSE

Main photo: Olympia, with a view of theSanctuary and, below, remnant columns

from the Temple of Zeus.

modernDIFFERENT

How can an elite athlete – who is rated asa great chance for a medal at the AthensOlympic Games – be a successful studentat the same time?

‘With dedication plus the help andsupport of a flexible and understandingacademic staff,’ says La Trobe Universitystudent, Warwick Draper.

Mr Draper, who is completing anElectronic Engineering and ComputerScience double degree at La TrobeBundoora, will represent Australia atAthens in the men’s Canoe Kayak Slalomevent.

‘It has been difficult at times to fit inboth training and study, as well asannual trips abroad for worldchampionships over the pastseven years. But thesupport of staff inboth the

Department of Electronic Engineering andComputer Science has made it possible,’says Warwick.

Mr Draper began at La Trobe in 1998and has studied both full and part time.Following the Athens Olympic Games hewill devote a greater part of his time tostudy and intends to complete both degreeswith full time study by the end of 2005.

‘My teachers at La Trobe have come to

know that I put in my absolute best when Ihave time. Because of this they have beenhelpful, and above all flexible, particularlywith assignment dates and lectures. Theirhelp enabled me to plan when I could dovarious subjects and assignments, whichallowed me to work in concentrated spellswhen the time was available.

‘In the same way, my coaches and othersat the Victorian Institute of Sport and theAustralian Institute of Sport havebeen most helpful inhelping me tojuggle

my studyneeds against my

training needs.’

His Olympic event is one of the mostexciting – and shortest – events in theOlympic Games.

Competing on an artificial 300 metrewhite water course, he must paddle hiskayak through 20 gates and otherobstacles, the whole event taking onlyabout 90 seconds. Competitors competeagainst the clock and lose points if theytouch the poles or other obstacles.

While success in national and statechampionships is important, the most

crucial domestic event for a canoeist is theAustralian National Team Selection. Overthe past two years, Mr Draper has beenranked number one in the National TeamSelection for his event.

He has won the Victorian Championshipthree times and was second in the NationalChampionship in 2003. He finished in 10thplace in the World Championships in

China

i n2 0 0 2

and 7thplace in the

World Cham-pionships at Penrith

in 2003.

Mr Draper’s Mini-Minorpanel van, with his Slovak-made

Optima design craft strapped to the roof,is a familiar sight in La Trobe car parks. Hetravels frequently from the campus totraining on the Yarra at Ivanhoe or, whenthe river is high and the water wild, atDight’s Falls. He also travels frequently toa slalom course on the Goulburn Rivernear Eildon Weir and the Olympic courseat Penrith, Sydney.

Successful or not at the Olympics, MrDraper intends to get a job in electronicswhen he graduates, something in which hecan use the skills gaining in both degrees.

Then he might devote a bit more time tohis other hobby, Capoeira, a Brazilianmartial art which takes in combat,acrobatics and dancing. �

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LA TROBE AND THE OLYMPICS

16

OLYMPICS AND STUDY –THEY CAN MIX SUCCESSFULLY