Margaret Olley: Life's journey - Office of Marketing and ...

UQNEWS, FEBRUARY 2009 ➔ 8SEAN FITZGIBBON PHOTOS STEWART GOULDDeadline for dengueA mosquito-borne virus that eachyear harms up to 100 million peopleand kills more than 20,000 is a stepcloser to being controlled after abreakthrough by UQ scientists.In a paper published in the prestigiousinternational journal Science in January, theresearchers have proven the effectiveness of anew way of limiting the lifespan of the type ofmosquito that spreads dengue fever.They have done it by infecting the denguemosquito, Aedes aegypti, with a bacterium thatis harmless to humans and other animals buthalves Aedes’ lifespan. This has theORPHANED KOALABECOMES MOTHERAn orphaned baby koala that wasflown 1200km to be raised in captivityhas recently become a first-time mum,following her successful return to thewild.In August 2005, the tiny five-month oldkoala named Shirley was found on a propertynear the Blair Athol Coal Mine in CentralQueensland and was rushed to the MoggillKoala Hospital in Brisbane.potential to greatly reduce dengue becauseonly old mosquitoes are effective at transmittingthe virus to humans.Carried out in the lab of Professor ScottO’Neill (pictured), the experiment’s involvedpainstaking work with the Aedes mosquito andWolbachia, a bacterium that occurs in fruit flies.PhD student Conor McMeniman usedsuper-fine needles to manually inject 10,000mosquito embryos with Wolbachia, andencouraged the surviving mosquitoes to feedon his own blood.“We ended up having to inject thousands ofembryos to achieve success, butit was well and truly worth it in theend,” Mr McMeniman said.Professor O’Neill saidthe project’s next stagewould be a contained fieldcage setting in northernQueensland.The scientists’ successis critical to the progress ofa $10 million project fundedby the Bill and MelindaGates Foundation and maylead to a new, safe andcheap way of curtailing thevirus.A year later Shirley was returned to the wild,but not before Dr Sean FitzGibbon, from UQ’sCentre for Mined Land Rehabilitation, fittedher with a radio-transmitting collar so he couldmonitor the success of her release.On a field visit last year, Dr FitzGibbonspotted Shirley curled up in a gum tree, andfound an extra surprise.“There was another pair of eyes lookingdown on me. Shirley has had a baby,” he said.“The fact that Shirley has come full circle andnow has young indicates that her rehabilitationto the wild has been extremely successful.“So many people worked as a team tokeep Shirley alive and now that she is a firsttimemother we know it has all beenworthwhile.”Fortunately for Shirley, her rescuer, anemployee at the Blair Athol Coal Mine, hadspent years working alongside scientistsfrom Koala Venture, a collaborationbetween UQ and Rio Tinto.Established in the early 1990s, KoalaVenture is the longest running koalamonitoring program in Australia and hasuncovered information about the life cycleof koalas, their dietary preferences andbreeding behaviours.Researchers work with Rio Tinto toensure mining activities are performed ina way which reduces negative impactsupon koalas and facilitates the restorationof suitable habitats.Shirley, who is now living happilyin Central Queensland with her joey,Pepper, is just one Koala Venturesuccess story.INFO ➔ To learn more about theproject, visit www.koalaventure.comEXHIBITION OPENSA new exhibit featuring morefossils of the world’s first moderncrocodilian has opened in Isisford,central-western Queensland.UQ palaeontologist Dr Steve Salisbury,who with his team have been spearheadingthe research in Isisford since 2001, saidthe exhibit was an extension of the existingdisplay that was first unveiled in 2006, atthe Outer Barcoo Interpretation Centre.“Our goal with this display was to sharewith the public the processes behind thescience of palaeontology,” Dr Salisbury said.“Everything from how we find fossilsin the field, gradually expose the bones inthe lab, and then interpret their scientificsignificance is shown in the new display.”He said the centrepiece is the completeskull of Isisfordia duncani, which wasuncovered after more than 1200 hours ofdrilling work by research assistant KerryGeddes (pictured).“The end result is spectacular asit’s easily the most complete and bestpreservedfossil crocodilian skull everdiscovered in Australia. It’s hard to believethat the animal to which it belonged hasbeen dead for almost 100 million years,” DrSalisbury said.INFO ➔ www.isisford.qld.gov.auPHOTOS CARL WARNER AND ANTHONY O’TOOLE