Main speakers include James Battey, who oversees hearing research for the National Institutes of Health, and Irving Weissman, a Great Falls native who is on the cutting edge of stem cell research and its potential for regenerating hearing.

"We're showing these scientists that good research is being done in Great Falls, Montana, where the necessary mouse models are one-third of the cost they are elsewhere," Weissman said Monday afternoon. Chairman of MRI's scientific advisory committee, Weissman directs the Institute of Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine.

"It's appropriate that these scientists are meeting in Great Falls," Pin Xu said, "because the Montana School for the Deaf and the Blind is here." She and fellow MRI scientist John Mercer have been researching the inner ear for about four years.

Mouse models will be pivotal in genetic research in sensory development, according to Battey, who is director of the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders.

"If we can replace or regenerate hair cells in the ear, a hearing aid is a poor substitute," he said.

Other researchers participating in the Great Falls workshop are from Harvard, House Ear Institute in Los Angeles, University of Washington, University of Virginia and University of Montana.

UM scientists are already studying the inner ear in collaboration with MRI, according to Richard Bridges, UM professor in the department of biomedical and pharmaceutical sciences.

"Research isn't just one lab anymore. It's collaboration," he said.

Last fall, MRI and UM received a multi-million NIH grant to study neurodegenerative diseases such as multiple sclerosis and Parkinson's.

By Paula Wilmot
http://www.greatfallstribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060418/NEWS01/604180304/1002