Arthritis and Inflammation Research Centre

Go to: Projects | Publications

In general the Hamilton group conducts research into inflammatory diseases within the Arthritis and Inflammation Research Centre and the Cooperative Research Centre for Chronic Inflammatory Diseases.

The major diseases studied are arthritis and atherosclerosis. The core biology involves that of the macrophage lineage. A variety of techniques and strategies are utilised including gene-based strategies (for example, micro-array technology) to understand disease causation, protein-based strategies (including proteomics, immunoprecipitation, cell transfection) to study the cellular signal transduction pathways associated with disease, and mouse models and clinical material to analyse disease in vivo.

Key components of the biology involve an analysis of how macrophage lineage cells are altered during inflammatory disease, how at a molecular level these cells survive, proliferate, differentiate or are activated, and how to down-regulate the cellular functions aberrant in disease. There is some emphasis on growth factor biology/biochemistry and on signal transduction pathways implicated strongly in human arthritis.

Current Projects

Title: GM-CSF and arthritis
Project Leader(s): Dr Andrew Cook
Staff/students: Ms Emma Braine, Mr Andrew Fleetwood
For more information: adcook@unimelb.edu.au

Title: Plasminogen activators and arthritis
Project Leader(s): Dr Andrew Cook, Dr Ross Vlahos
Staff/students: Ms Emma Braine
For more information: adcook@unimelb.edu.au

Title: Proteomics and CSF-1 Signal Transduction
Project Leader(s): Dr Maddalena Cross
For more information: m.cross@unimelb.edu.au

Title: Mechanism of macrophage survival in atherogenesis
Project leader: Dr Caryn Elsegood
Staff/student: Margaret Chang (PhD student)
For more information: c.elsegood@unimelb.edu.au or m.chang@pgrad.unimelb.edu.au

Title: Factors controlling the differentiation of macrophage lineage cells into osteoclasts
Project Leader(s):Prof. John Hamilton, Dr. Peter Kitchener
Staff/students: Roya Lari (PhD student)
For more information: r.lari@pgrad.unimelb.edu.au

Title: In vitro generation of human macrophages
Project Leader(s): Sika Ristevski
Staff/Students: Mr Felix Clanchy
For more information: Sika.Ristevski@med.monash.edu.au

Title: Proliferative Monocytes
Project Leader(s): Sika Ristevski
Staff/Students: Mr Felix Clanchy
For more information: Sika.Ristevski@med.monash.edu.au

Title: Mouse COPD models
Project Leader: Dr Ross Vlahos
For more information: rossv@unimelb.edu.au

Title: Molecular dissection of the regulation of macrophage survival
Project Leader(s): Dr Glen Scholz
Staff/students: Paul Masendycz, Adrian Achuthan (PhD student), Dominic Stipanov (Honours student)
For more information: glenms@unimelb.edu.au

Title: Regulation of Toll-like receptor signal transduction in macrophages
Project Leader(s): Dr Glen Scholz
Staff/students: Paul Masendycz, Sokwei Ho
For more information: glenms@unimelb.edu.au

Title: Defining the role and contribution of Cdc37 to signal transduction and tumourigenesis by Src-family kinases
Project Leader(s): Dr Glen Scholz
Staff/students: Sokwei Ho
For more information: glenms@unimelb.edu.au

Title: Molecular mechanisms regulating the stability of cancer causing protein tyrosine kinases
Project Leader(s): Dr Glen Scholz
Staff/students: Sokwei Ho
For more information: glenms@unimelb.edu.au

Publications

1. Hamilton JA (2003). Non-disposable materials, chronic inflammation and adjuvant action. Journal of Leukocyte Biology, 73:702–12.
2. Lotze MT & Hamilton JA (2003). Macrophage Colony Stimulating Factor (M-CSF; colony stimulating factor-1) (review) In: The Cytokine Handbook, 4th edition. J. Holding (ed.), Elsevier Science Ltd. pp. 545–73.
3. Hamilton JA (2002). GM-CSF in inflammation and autoimmunity (a review), Trends in Immunol, 23:403–08.
4. Cook AD, Braine EL, Campbell IK & Hamilton JA (2002). Differing roles for urokinase and tissue-type plasminogen activator in collagen-induced arthritis. Am J Pathol, 160:917–26.
5. Csar XF, Wilson NJ, McMahon KA, Marks DC, Beecroft TL, Ward AC & Hamiltom JA (2001). Proteomic analysis of macrophage differentiation: p46/52Shc tyrosine phosphorylation is required for CSF-1-mediated macrophage differentiation. J Biol Chem, 276:26211–17.
6. Campbell IK, Hamilton JA & Wicks IP (2000). Collagen-induced arthritis in C57BL/6 (H-2b) mice: new insights into an important disease model of rheumatoid arthritis. Eur J Immunol, 30:1568–75.
7. Kanagasundaram VK, Jaworowsk A, Byrne R and Hamilton JA (1999). Separation and characterization of the activated pool of colony-stimulating factor 1 receptor forming distinct multimeric complexes with signalling molecules in macrophages. Mol Cell Biol, 19:4079–92.
8. Campbell IK, Rich MJ, Bischof RJ, Dunn AR, Grail D & Hamilton JA (1998). Protection from collagen-induced arthritis in granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor-deficient mice. J. Immunol., 161:3639–44.
9. Vadiveloo PK, Vairo G, Novak U, Royston AK, Whitty G, Filonzi EL, Cragoe Jr EJ & Hamilton JA (1996). Differential regulation of cell cycle machinery by various antiproliferative agents is linked to macrophage arrest at distinct G1 checkpoints. Oncogene, 13:599–608.
10. Hamilton JA (1993). Hypothesis: Rheumatoid arthritis: The opposing actions of haemopoietic growth factors and slow-acting anti-rheumatic drugs. The Lancet, 342:536–9.