“Longer life and fertility: the promise of ageing research”
Dr Lindsay Wu
NH&MRC Senior Research Fellow
UNSW Sydney
Date: Thursday, 19 May 2022 6.30 pm AEST
Venue: RSL Mittagong, Carrington Room
Summary: The dream of a “fountain of youth” can be found across diverse cultures dating back thousands of years. Today, scientists are studying the biology of ageing to identify new molecular processes that underlie the ageing process, with the discovery of new drug and diet interventions that can extend late-life health and overall lifespan. Aside from the potential to improve our quality of life as we grow older, these interventions could be used to treat a wide range of conditions that occur at younger ages. I will discuss these in my talk, with a special emphasis on the work my lab is doing to prolong female fertility and hopefully reduce the need for couples to use IVF to obtain pregnancy.
Dr Lindsay Wu is a metabolic biochemist and Senior Research Fellow at UNSW where he leads the Laboratory for Ageing Research in the School of Medical Science. He has been asked to provide extensive media commentary on ageing research, and to write articles for the general public in The Conversation. One of these articles was selected as a top 50 article of the year, published in the annual yearbook “Ideas from Australia’s 50 Top Thinkers”.
Dr Wu’s expertise in ageing research has been well recognised in industry, where he is the Chief Scientific Advisor, and Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board to Life Biosciences. He has organised and led researchers in ageing across Australia in lobbying efforts to promote the importance of fundamental ageing research and in addition has led and organised meetings between researchers in ageing and the Federal Minister for Health (Greg Hunt), and Federal Minister for Aged Care (Ken Wyatt). He has at least 50 publications in peer reviewed journals and several chapters in books.