DOCUMENT

Headlines 15 He continued studying dopamine neurons in the lab, picking up Italian as he worked. (His wife Shelley, a nurse, was with him in Rome.) He started looking at endocannabinoids – cannabis- like substances that the brain naturally produces – and found a newmechanism of regulating activity in the neurons. “I wanted to know, what are they doing when they’re not involved with Parkinson’s disease? How do they connect with others?” After two years, Peter and Shelley were on their way home when they got some good news. “Somewhere in the Middle East, I opened an email saying I got the Neurological Foundation repatriation grant,” he says. That supported him fully for one year and paid some working expenses to reestablish himself in Auckland. He returned to Professor Lipski’s lab and, using the equipment there, established the endocanabinol project to gather more data. “At that point, I was able to explore my own questions,” says Peter. Professor Lipski, while now retired, is following his work with interest. “He’s still cheering for me from the sidelines.” GENERATION seasoned researcher “Fellowships are a combination of the person and the science. Project funding is more about the science – it’s when you come up with your own research question, and the plan to answer that question. Winning it, that’s quite an achievement. Funding from the Neurological Foundation is highly respected. I was pretty pleased.” Peter as a young summer student in 2002