AKN 2006 Meeting Summary

The Association of Korean Neuroscientists Annual Symposium 2006 was held from 5:30 PM - 8:00 PM on Tuesday, October 17 th , 2006 in Georgia World Congress Center (Room B304/305) in Atlanta , Georgia , USA . The current President of AKN, Dr. Hemin Chin, inaugurated the meeting with greetings and acknowledgements of sponsors, AKN officers, and distinguished members. The first half of the meeting consisted of a formal reception and a poster session during which 34 graduate students and postdoctoral fellows from the US and Korea presented their research results and held discussions with other scientists. The poster session was followed by Dr. Cho Zanghee's presentation titled, "Advances in Neuroimaging with Ultra High Resolution PET and 7.0T High Field MRI", which illustrated the tremendous advances that his group in Gacheon Medical School has achieved in the field of neuroimaging. Finally, 5 AKN President's Outstanding Research Awards and 5 AKN Excellence in Research Awards were presented.

Financial support acknowledgment:
We are grateful for the support of the following sponsors of AKN2006: SeouLinBioscience Korea , Brain Research Center ( The MOST 21C Frontier Program in Neuroscience; Director: Dr. Kyungjin Kim ), Macrogen, and Gacheon Medical School (through Professor Zhanghee Cho).

Message from Dr. Hemin Chin

On behalf of the 2006 AKN Symposium Committee, I am very pleased to report to you that we had another successful AKN Annual Symposium this year, with the help of Dr. Jackie Lee ( University of Colorado at Boulder ) and Prof. Hyun Kim ( Korea University ) who have served as Secretary and Treasurer, respectively.  It has been my honor and privilege to serve as the President of AKN for the last two years and to have had the opportunity to further the goals of AKN by extending and expanding the past accomplishments.  We have made excellent progress toward promoting and facilitating scientific collaborations and social interactions among the Korean-American and Korean neuroscientists. Without your support and active participation, this would not have been possible.  To sustain the momentum we have achieved, we need to strive for an even more enthusiastic participation by each member in all aspects of AKN activities. To this end, we are launching a new user-friendly AKN website which will be the focal point of our interaction throughout the year.  

At this year's council meeting, Dr. Un Jung Kang was elected to serve as the next AKN president with a unanimous support of the AKN Council. Dr. Kang will begin his two-year term starting Jan 1, 2007 .  I believe that under Dr. Kang's leadership, AKN is well poised for excellent growth in membership, especially with the second generation Korean-American neuroscientists, and for a greater participation and success by the current and future AKN members.  

In closing, I would like you to join me in thanking Dr. Jackie Lee, Dr. Hyun Kim, other Council members, and AKN symposium committee members for their tireless and dedicated service, and in pledging our continued support for the new AKN leadership under Dr. Kang.

Last but not least, we are grateful for the generous support provided by the sponsors of AKN during the last two years: SeouLin Bioscience, Brain Research Center ( The MOST 21C Frontier Program in Neuroscience; Director: Dr. Kyungjin Kim) , Macrogen, and Gacheon Medical School (and Professor Zhanghee Cho) .

2006 Award Recipients:

AKN President's Outstanding Research Award

Kyung-Ae Ji
Ajou University
PI: Eun-Hye Joe
"Critical roles of neutrophil infiltration in inflammation and dopaminergic neuron death in the substantia nigra: implications for Parkinson's disease"

Seung-Hee Lee
Seoul National University
PI: Bong-Kiun Kaang
"Nuclear translocation of an apCAM-associated Protein (CAMAP) is Critical for Long-Term Facilitation in Aplysia"

Jaewon Ko, Ph.D.
KAIST
PI: Eunjoon Kim
"Regulation of the differentiation of excitatory synapses by the SALM family of PSD-95-interacting cell adhesion-like molecules"

Jeong-Woo Sohn
University of Rochester
PI: D. Lee
"Retrospective and prospective coding of movement directions in the medial frontal cortex"

Mee-Ohk Kim, Ph.D.
Mass General, Harvard Medical School
PI: Jang Ho J. Cha
"Role for histone monoubiquitylation in transcriptional dysregulation in Huntington's disease"

AKN President's Excellence In Research Award

Jiyeon Jang
Seoul National University
PI: Yong-Keun Jung
"Novel genes, ADRG2 and ADRG4, isolated by cell-based functional screening increase A generation by enhancing ?-secretase activity"

Jee Yone Lee
Kyunghee University
PI: Tae Hwan Oh
"Minocycline reduces apoptosis of oligodendrocytes by inhibition of p38MAPK-dependent pro-NGF production in microglia and improves functional recovery after spinal cord injury"

Yuyoung Joo
Seoul National University
PI: Yoo-Hun Suh
"Mefenamic acid Shows Neuroprotective Effects and Improves Cognitive Impairment in in vitro and in vivo Alzheimer's Disease Models"

Man Su Kim
University of Iowa
PI: Y. M. Usachev
"Mitochondria regulates activation of the transcription factor NFAT in DRG neurons"

Sang-Ho Choi, Ph.D.
NIH
PI: Francesca Bosetti
"Deletion of cyclooxygenase-1 reduces the cerebral inflammation and oxidative stress induced by intracerebroventricular administration of lipopolysaccharide"