About the Authors

Yejun Wang

Contributed equally to this work with: Yejun Wang, Anneke van der Walt

Affiliation The Centre for Neuroscience Research, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

Anneke van der Walt

Contributed equally to this work with: Yejun Wang, Anneke van der Walt

Affiliations The Centre for Neuroscience Research, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia, The Department of Neurology, The Royal Melbourne Hospital, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

Mark Paine

Affiliation The Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital, East Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

Alexander Klistorner

Affiliation The Sydney Eye Hospital, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

Helmut Butzkueven

Affiliations Department of Medicine, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia, The Department of Neurology, The Royal Melbourne Hospital, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

Gary F. Egan

Affiliation Monash Biomedical Imaging, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, Australia

Trevor J. Kilpatrick

Affiliations The Centre for Neuroscience Research, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia, The Department of Neurology, The Royal Melbourne Hospital, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

Scott C. Kolbe

kolbes@unimelb.edu.au

Affiliation The Centre for Neuroscience Research, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia

Competing Interests

Dr. van der Walt has received travel support from Bayer Australia and Sanofi Aventis. She has received unrestricted grants from Bayer Asutralia and Biogen Idec. Dr. Klistorner is supported by an unrestricted grant from Biogen Idec. Dr. Butzkueven has served on scientific advisory boards for Biogen Idec, Novartis and Sanofi-Aventis and has received conference travel support from Novartis, Biogen Idec andSanofi Aventis. He serves on steering committees for trials conducted by Merck Serono, Biogen Idec and Novartis. Dr. Butzkueven has received research support from Merck Serono, Novartis and Biogen Idec in his capacity as honorary chair of the MSBase Foundation. Dr. Kilpatrick has served on scientific advisory boards for GlaxoSmithKline, Neurosciences Victoria and the Victorian Neurotrauma Initiative; has received funding for travel from Bayer Schering pharma, Sanofi Aventis and Merck Serono; served on the editorial board of Therapeutic Advances in Neurological Disorders; is listed as an inventor on patents re: HIV test kit method for detecting anti-HIV-1 antibodies in saliva; A method of modulating cell survival and reagents useful for the same; Methods for the treatment and prophylaxis of demyelinating disease; and Method of treatment in the field of inflammatory neurodegeneration; and receives research support from Bayer Schering Pharma, Biogen IDEC. Dr. Egan serves on an ARC college of experts panel for which he receives personal compensation, he is a member of the Neurosciences Victoria scientific advisory board; he has received travel expenses and/or honoraria for lectures or educational activities not funded by industry; he is an associate editor of Human Brain Mapping, he serves on the editorial boards of Neuroimage and the Journal of Imaging Technology.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: AK MP SK TK AvdW HB GE. Performed the experiments: AK YW AvdW SK. Analyzed the data: AK SK YW AvdW. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: SK YW. Wrote the paper: YW AvdW SK.