INSTITUTE FOR INFECTIOUS DISEASE RESEARCH
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Study suggests alternate methods of TB vaccination
A new study by researchers from the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research suggests the importance of studying both innate and adaptive arms of host defense in TB vaccine research.
Understanding ribosome biogenesis just got easier
Researchers with the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) have opened doors to better understand the assembly process of the ribosome, by making a new observation that may significantly impact the way scientists target bacteria.
“In this work we studied the last stages of maturation of the bacterial ribosome, the enzyme that synthesizes proteins in the cells,” explains Joaquin Ortega, associate professor of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences, about a paper published this month in RNA. His team involved researcher Vivian Leong and graduate students Meredith Kent and Ahmad Jomaa.
Antibiotic resistance: Apocalypse Now?
Antibiotic resistance is a worsening problem for us, but a natural and ancient phenomenon, argues Gerard Wright in a Question and Answer article published today inBMC Biology. The inevitable emergence and spread of resistance in human pathogens can only be met by the development of new drugs, yet there are few new antibiotics coming to market or in clinical trials. It can take up to a decade to bring a new drug from the lab to the pharmacy, so the problem is likely to exist for some time to come.
McMaster acquires first BioSAXS system in Canada
Through the Leaders Opportunity Fund from the Canadian Foundation for Innovation, McMaster biochemists Alba Guarné and Murray Junop, a member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, have created a state-of-the-art crystallization and diffraction facility.
Awards applaud innovation
By integrating tools and technologies – from genomics to small molecules – to target drugs from nature, investigator Nathan Magarvey is helping build a culture of innovation at McMaster University.
As a result, Magarvey, a member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) and Assistant Professor in the Departments of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences and Chemistry & Chemical Biology, has been named McMaster’s Innovator of the Year.
Trainees embrace collaboration
Trainees from the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research are embracing the spirit of collaboration.
A team of approximately 20 trainees from a diverse range of labs, including academic supervisors Nathan Magarvey, professor in the Departments of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences and Chemistry & Chemical Biology and Mike Surette, professor in the Department of Medicine and Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences, will compete in the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) Competition on Oct. 4-6 in Toronto.
Faculty of Health Sciences celebrates its students
Faculty of Health Science graduate students and postdoctoral fellows are being celebrated this week during an annual Research Plenary, an open forum event that includes more than 400 poster and oral presentations.
The event is being held from May 14-16 in the Health Sciences library and winning posters will be on display in the Jan and Mien Heersink Reading Pavilion the afternoon of Thursday, May 23, followed by an awards reception.
Pictured during the opening poster session, from left, are first-year PhD students Brian Tuinema (Coombes lab) and Fiona Whelan (Surette lab).
Presentation times and topics can be found here.
Wright students bring home awards
Congratulations to Nicole Robbins, Andrew King and Georgina Cox in the Wright lab for their success in receiving recent prestigious awards.
The poop on ancient man
Hendrik Poinar, an assistant professor in McMaster's Department of Anthropology and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, believes that ancient DNA holds the answers to a host of major scientific questions: Did the first peoples come to North America in a single migration, or several? What were the pre-Columbian diseases on this continent? Were there dietary differences between the sexes in archaic hunter-gatherer populations?
Read a profile on Dr. Poinar and his research in the Globe and Mail.
Lab discovers path to extreme antibiotic resistance in Pseudomonas aeruginosa
Combining two mutations in non-essential genes can lead to extreme antibiotic resistance in Pseudomonas aeruginosa, one of the leading causes of hospital-inquired infections.
These findings come from a new study published in the journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, led by Lori Burrows, McMaster biochemistry professor and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research and her trainees Joseph Cavallari and Ryan Lamers.
IIDR members talk superbugs on TEDx McMaster U
IIDR members David Earn, professor of mathematics and statistics, and Eric Brown, professor and chair of the Department of Biochemistry at McMaster, joined a recent TEDx McMaster U panel to discuss "Visualizing and modelling contagion" and "Taking on superbugs with new insights into uncharted biology", respectively.
Click here to view the videos on YouTube.
Superbugs: Why we should fear them
An article in the Toronto Star this week talks about how resistance to antibiotics is growing and drug companies are doing little to respond. Some scientists, including Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research at McMaster University, warn of deadly consequences. (Source: The Toronto Star)
Antibiotic progress on superbugs called 'alarmingly slow'
Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, comments on CBC News about a recent Infectious Diseases Society of America progress review on the development of new drugs, which found only two new antibiotics had been approved since 2009.
"We have spent several years hunting around Canada and around the world to isolate new bacteria and pull out from them as many compounds as we can," Wright says in the article.
Wright is using new technology that can screen hundreds of compounds at the same time. He hopes it will speed up the challenging search. (Source: CBC News)
McMaster opens $22M Biointerfaces Institute
The University officially opened the Biointerfaces Institute, Canada's first facility for developing unique new surfaces, using high-speed robots and other leading-edge technology. IIDR member John Brennan, professor and Canada Research Chair in Bioanalytical Chemistry and Biointerfaces, will lead a team of 10 core faculty members.
IIDR member Fred Capretta, Associate Director of the Biointerfaces Institute, talks about the the facility's capabilities in the video below, including the ability to develop materials such as hospital doorknobs that can repel bacteria, bandages that can heal wounds, home test kits for cholesterol and contact lenses that rarely need changing.
Fred Capretta comments on CHCH about ricin letters in US
IIDR member Fred Capretta, an associate professor of Chemistry, comments on CHCH about two letters - one intended for the president, another for a U.S. senator - and a mail screening facility that have all tested positive for ricin.
Vaccines: Truths & Myths
Vaccines save lives. In fact, they save millions of lives a year and prevent diseases like polio, measles and mumps from making a dangerous comeback. Yet, childhood immunizations continue to be avoided by many people around the world for fear that they overwhelm the immune system, cause autism and contain dangerous preservatives.
Community members are invited to join in a lively and informal discussion to help sort the facts from fiction with leading experts from McMaster University’s Immunology Research Centre and the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research.
The free event, titled Vaccines: Truths & Myths, will take place April 29 from 7-9 pm at the Royal Botanical Gardens.
Click here to download the poster.
McMaster celebrates Royal Society of Canada Fellows
Over the last five decades, 80 members of McMaster’s research community have earned one of the country’s highest academic accolades available to leading intellectuals, scholars, researchers and artists – election to a Fellowship in the Royal Society of Canada (RSC).
Gerry Wright, Scientific Director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, joined this esteemed group in 2012 and was honoured at a recent event celebrating McMaster’s Fellows of the RSC, hosted by President Patrick Deane and Vice-President, Research & International Affairs, Mo Elbestawi.
Not all mammoths were woolly
IIDR member and McMaster evolutionary geneticist Hendrik Poinar speaks about bringing the woolly mammoth back to life during a TEDx Conference on DeExtinction in Washington on March 15.
Drug rocks the boat
A ‘gold-standard’ drug has been found to have a secondary mode of action, as not only does it inhibit antibiotic efflux pumps, responsible for pumping toxic substances and antibiotics out of the cell and major contributors to multi-drug resistance, but also punches holes in membranes, causing resistance enzymes to leak out.
Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences Professor Lori Burrows, a member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) and her postdoctoral researcher Ryan Lamers, recently discovered that Phenylalanine-Arginine Beta-Naphthylamide (PAbN) can punch holes in bacterial membranes, causing resistance enzymes normally found inside the bacteria to leak out and rendering the bacteria more susceptible, independent of efflux inhibition.
Undergraduate Student Research Awards push interest in science
Two undergraduate students in the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research have received Undergraduate Student Research Awards through the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, allowing them to continue to work alongside their mentors over the summer months.
Antibiotic resistance a growing crisis
Gerry Wright, Scientific Director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, commentates in the Toronto Star about the ongoing threat of antibiotic resistance and need for urgent action.
His commentary follows the Ontario Medical Association report titled “When Antibiotics Stop Working,” (see story below) calling on the provincial and federal governments to address this growing crisis of antibiotic resistance while there is still time.
Ontario's doctors: antibiotic resistance poses major threat to public health
On March 20, 2013 the Ontario Medical Association released a report titled "When Antibiotics Stop Working," with recommendations about how government and the health community should respond to antibiotic resistance. Ontario’s doctors warn that the over-use of medicines weakens doctors' ability to save human lives and they call on federal and provincial governments to immediately enact regulatory changes that will help to reverse this threat by reducing the growth of antibiotic resistant bacteria.
The doctors know what they’re talking about in warning against overuse of antibiotics, says Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research. He says antibiotic resistant bacteria are being found everywhere, even in dirt.
“As a society we’re are not used to finding that what did cure people doesn’t work anymore. These recommendations of the physicians are important to raise awareness of how we all need to respond now, as we search out new ways to fight antibiotic resistance.”
Click here to read the full report.
IIDR prizes encourage promising young scientists
The Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) recognized two promising young scientists during the recent Bay Area Science and Engineering Fair.
Eisha Ahmed, a Grade 12 student of Abbey Park High School in Oakville, was the first place winner of the IIDR prize that recognized the best senior project in infectious disease, drug discovery or human health. The second place IIDR winner was Junyi (Sarah) Wu, who won the overall BASEF prize. Wu is from Assumption College School, Brant Haldimand Norfolk Catholic District School Board.
The IIDR prizes were judged and selected by members Dawn Bowdish and Karen Mossman, Assistant Professor and Associate Professor of Pathology and Molecular Medicine, respectively
More than 400 students took part in the 53rd annual fair at Hillfield Strathallan College and Mohawk College.
Click here to read the coverage in the Hamilton Specator.
(Photo courtesy Wayne Bowdish)
Biochemistry researcher racks up awards
The awards continue to mount for Ryan Lamers, a postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Lori Burrows, a member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research and biochemistry professor.
Lamers was recently awarded a two-year Cystic Fibrosis Canada Fellowship, and the 2013/14 Cystic Fibrosis Canada-Kin in Canada Fellowship, an honorary award given to the highest ranked applicant in the competition. The award follows a Michael G. DeGroote Fellowship Award, considered one of McMaster’s Faculty of Health Sciences most prestigious awards.
Nathan Magarvey awarded Canada Research Chair
Nathan Magarvey, member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research and assistant professor of Biochemsitry and Biomedical Sciences, has been awarded a new Canada Research Chair.
As Canada Research Chair in Natural Product Drug Discovery (Tier 2) Magarvey will use a number of integrated tools and technologies – from genomics to small molecules – to target drugs from nature. His focus will be to mine these natural source materials for new bioactive compounds, so they can be produced into a more efficacious and targeted therapy for diseases.
Study describes bacterial “twitching”
Former IIDR trainee Herlinder Takhar has published a paper in the Journal of Biological Chemistry describing the characterization of a critical component of the motor that powers bacterial “twitching” motility through retraction of fibers called type IV pili.
The paper, by the recent Masters student in the lab of Lori Burrows, biochemistry professor and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, resolves a debate about which protein connects the cytoplasmic enzymes that provide the energy for movement to the rest of the pilus assembly system.
Takhar held a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate Scholarship and an Ontario Graduate Scholarship. She is now working as a Supply Center Specialist with Life Technologies.
(Photo: Takhar, left, with her former supervisor Lori Burrows)
To view the study click here
Public health role in controlling infectious disease outbreaks focus of panel discussion
Common viral infections such as a cold or the flu are something we all have to deal with in everyday life, and most of the time are not cause for alarm. However, some viral infections, such as HIV and particular strains of influenza, can become extremely dangerous or even fatal.
With our increasingly mobile society, the risk of outbreaks of infectious diseases that can create global health threats, such as happened with SARS and H1N1, has led to an increased emphasis on public health policy as it relates to controlling pandemics.
Bringing the extinct back to life
National Geographic News asked Hendrik Poinar, a molecular evolutionary geneticist and biological anthropologist at the Ancient DNA Centre at McMaster University and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, if we might soon see the gigantic land mammals roaming the steppe again. Poinar will speak about the emerging technology at the TEDx Conference on DeExtinction in Washington on March 15.
New member joins Scientific Advisory Board
David M. Shlaes, an international expert in the field of antimicrobial resistance research, has joined the External Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR).
The Scientific Advisory Board consists of accomplished and distinguished members of the scientific community considered internationally respected leaders in infectious disease and antimicrobial research.
Popular drug faces resistance in a common fungal pathogen
Resistance has taken another victim, this time one of the world’s most common antifungal medications used to treat upper-respiratory illness and air-born allergens.
The drugs, called triazoles, have been shown to be ineffective against a common fungal pathogen called Aspergillus fumigatus in several parts of India. Researchers have determined that the most likely cause for the origin and spread of the resistance is the heavy application of agricultural fungicides.
Researchers create novel approach to identify chemicals bacteria "see"
Researchers from McMaster University’s Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research have devised a new way to identify the molecules, including antibiotics, that bacteria sense.
Developed by Leslie Cuthbertson, a postdoctoral fellow working with Justin Nodwell, Professor of Biochemistry & Biomedical Sciences, the new process predicts chemicals recognized by members of an important family of transcription factors, called “the TetR family”. They incorporated more than 4,000 proteins to create a framework for identifying these chemical/protein interactions. They then used this framework to successfully identify an antibiotic molecule for a transcription factor of unknown function, showing that the gene regulated in response to this antibiotic encodes a novel antibiotic resistance protein.
Justin Nodwell embarks on new path
His original plans had more to do with sonatas and concert halls than science.
“I wanted to be a concert pianist when I was a little kid,” says Justin Nodwell, Professor of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) at McMaster University. “In fact, I was sure that was what I was going to do until I was 14. I took lessons and exams and all that sort of thing; my heroes were Glenn Gould and a bunch of dead composers. It really was my life. And then I bombed the Collegiate II piano exam at McGill and decided it was all over.”
Seed funding sparks new scientific discoveries
From studying the effects of Vitamin D supplements as a way to prevent influenza to understanding the assembly process of the ribosome as a target for new antibiotics, the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research is set to make exciting new scientific discoveries in 2013.
Five projects have been selected for seed funding in 2013, including projects by members Mark Loeb, David Earn and Ben Bolker and Eric Brown and Joaquin Ortega, Hendrik Poinar and James Mahoney.
Each team will present a summary of their findings at IIDR’s Annual General Meeting on April 24, 2013 at the Ancaster Mill.
Ontario Lung Association, Pfizer Canada, recognize Dawn Bowdish
Dawn Bowdish, Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine and researcher with the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research at McMaster University, has been awarded the Ontario Lung Association-Pfizer Canada Infectious Diseases Award.
She was presented the $50,000 award at a recent annual fundraiser called Breathe! Gala, hosted by the Ontario Lung Association.
Gerry Wright joins American Academy of Microbiology fellowship
Gerry Wright, scientific director of McMaster University's Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, has been elected to the Fellowship of the American Academy of Microbiology.
The Academy, the honorific leadership group within the American Society for Microbiology (ASM), recognizes excellence, originality, and creativity in the microbiological sciences. Wright will be recognized at the Academy Fellows Luncheon and Meeting at the 113th ASM General Meeting in Denver on Tuesday, May 21.
Scientists discover new small molecules that protect bacteria against toxic gold
McMaster researchers have discovered that gold resistant bacterium Delftia acidovorans can turn toxic water-soluble gold into a solid gold form, the first demonstration that gold-resistant microbe secretes a metabolite that can protect against toxic gold.
The research, published in Nature Chemical Biology, was led by Nathan Magarvey, an investigator with the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research at McMaster University and Assistant Professor in the Departments of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences and Chemistry & Chemical Biology.
Research stresses importance of broadening HIV prevention strategies
A new study that measures the importance of different routes of transmission in 18 African countries and regions provides support for an aggressive ‘test and treat’ approach which would seek to identify and offer treatment to all HIV-positive individuals in Africa.
“By investigating what can be learned about routes of heterosexual transmission in sub-Saharan Africa from large-scale survey data we found that pre-couple, within-couple and extra-couple transmission are all important,” says Jonathan Dushoff, Associate Professor of Biology at McMaster University, member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, and senior author on the study released online this week by Lancet
CIHR funding propels IIDR research
Several IIDR researchers have secured funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, with two projects ranked first and second nationwide in the microbiology and infectious disease category.
IIDR members Lori Burrows, Charu Kaushic, Ali Ashkar, Zhou Xing and Russell Bishop have been awarded five-year grants that will propel their research to new levels.
Poinar chats on Q
Evolutionary geneticist and IIDR member Hendrik Poinar was featured on the CBC Radio show Q last week.
The show, a daily arts, culture and entertainment program hosted by Jian Ghomeshi, was taped Thursday night in front of a live audience at Mohawk College's McIntyre Performing Arts Centre.
Poinar, an associate professor of anthropology and director of McMaster's Ancient DNA Centre, recently made headlines when he and a team of researchers sequenced the entire genome of the Black Death. He has also mapped the genome of the wooly mammoth.
Q airs at 10 a.m. on CBC Radio One.
Click here for the online podcast.
20 years doing it "The Wright Way"
Past and present lab members of Gerry Wright, Director of the Michael G DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, celebrated 20 years of "Doing it the Wright Way," on Friday, Jan. 25.
The lab hosted a surprise symposium for Wright to mark 20 years of the Wright lab. Invited guest speakers included past students Paul Thompson, former graduate student (1993-1999) and now an associate professor in the Department of Chemistry TSRI, Scripps Florida; Ian Moore, a former post-doc (2002-2005) and now an application scientist at Applied Biosystems; Lindsay Kalan, a former PhD student (2007-2012) and now a lead research scientist at Exciton Technologies Inc.; Geoff McKay, Wright’s first graduate student (1993-1999) and now a scientist at MUHC Research Institute; and David Boehr, a former graduate student (1996-2003), and now an assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry at The Pennsylvania State University. Other presenters included current lab members Erin Westman and Peter Spanogiannopoulos. In his 20 years Wright has supervised 16 Ph.D students, 16 master's students and 18 post-doctoral researchers.
To view a photo slideshow from the event, click here.
Top IIDR students receive esteemed fellowship
In the lab, Ryan Lamers is on a constant quest to stay one step ahead of the third most dangerous pathogen afflicting Canadian hospitals.
“We study the mechanisms of antibiotic resistance in Pseudomonas aeruginosa, which is quite prevalent in cystic fibrosis patients but is very resistant to antibiotics,” says Lamers, a postdoctoral researcher in the lab of Professor Lori Burrows, a member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR). “My overarching goal, the reason I come in each day, is to stay ahead of the Pseudomonas pathogen that is quite opportunistic in hospitals and one of the top three pathogens that infect people in hospitals.”
Researchers find age not factor in immunity to viruses
Our immune system does not shut down with age, says a new study led by McMaster University researchers.
A study published in PLOS Pathogens today shows a specialized class of immune cells, known as T cells, can respond to virus infections in an older person with the same vigour as T cells from a young person.
“For a long time, it was thought the elderly were at a higher risk of infections because they lacked these immune cells, but that simply isn’t the case,” said Jonathan Bramson, the study’s principal investigator and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infecious Disease Research. “The elderly are certainly capable of developing immunity to viruses.”
Mushroom not main cause of mystery deaths in China: McMaster researcher
Jianping Xu is featured in CBC.ca today for his research that debunks a theory that some 400 people in southwestern China died mysterious, sudden deaths from eating a toxic mushroom.
Xu has spent the last four summers climbing mountains and slogging through forests in search of the Trogia venenata, a mushroom once suspected of causing fatal heart attacks with its high concentration of the metal barium.
To read the CBC story, click here
'Fecal transplants' used to treat C. difficile cases in Hamilton
It's unnerving, it's invasive and it's extremely awkward to talk about, but a controversial procedure being performed at St. Joseph's Hospital in Hamilton is saving lives.
Dr. Christine Lee has been giving fecal transplants in Hamilton since 2008.
The treatment, used to treat C. difficile, involves introducing stool from a healthy donor into an infected patient's bowel, usually through an enema.
Lee, member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research and the medical director of infection prevention and control at St. Joseph's Hospital, started using the procedure to treat C. difficile cases in patients who weren't responding to regular therapy.
“We were running out of options,” she said. So fecal transplants were implemented — and they have had a staggering effectiveness rate of around 90 per cent.
(Source: CBC News)
World Aids Day highlights urgency of global epidemic
An estimated 34.2 million people worldwide live with HIV, a statistic the World Health Organization hopes hit home during World Aids Day on December 1, a day meant to raise awareness about this global epidemic. The latest report released from UNAIDS contains encouraging numbers showing significant decrease in new HIV infections especially in Africa where the global effort to provide wide scale treatment is starting to show results. For latest information on UNAIDS report see http://www.unaids.org/en/
At McMaster, Charu Kaushic and Ken Rosenthal, members of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) and professors in the Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine, have taken great strides in understanding HIV/AIDS.
Bowdish lab elucidates evolution of the class A scavenger receptors
Fiona Whelan, a Master's student in Dawn Bowdish's lab, has published her first manuscript “The Evolution of the class A scavenger receptors” in BMC Evolutionary Biology. The goal of the manuscript was to use evolution as a guide to discover how the class A scavenger receptor family was formed and to identify regions of conservation and hence probable functional importance for future study.
Answering the "killer mushroom" question
He would sometimes trek over 30 kilometers a day through mountainous terrain, inclement weather and on muddy footpaths, to find the answer to one simple question: “Was barium in wild mushrooms the cause of more than 400 unexplained deaths throughout southwest China over the past 30 years?”
The journey was so treacherous it once sent one of his co-travellers to hospital with fatigue and dehydration. But the answer McMaster biologist Jianping Xu found shatters a myth started in 2010 from a news article in the journal Science, that claimed the Trogia venenata mushroom contained high concentrations of the metal barium, causing high blood pressure, cardiac arrests and sudden deaths. The deaths mainly occurred in small villages, some of which saw nearly one-third of their population perish quickly and within very short periods of time.
Probiotics show potential to minimize C. difficile
New cases of C. difficile-associated diarrhea among hospitalized patients taking antibiotics can be reduced by two-thirds with the use of probiotics, according to new research published Monday in the Annals of Internal Medicine.
“Probiotics are not a magic bullet, but these results suggest therapeutic probiotic agents, as well as some yogurts and probiotic dairy products, may be vastly under-used in some nursing homes and hospitals,” says lead author Bradley Johnston, assistant professor in the Department of Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, and a scientist and clinical epidemiologist at SickKids Hospital in Toronto.
IIDR member Mark Loeb, professor of Pathology and Molecular Medicine in the Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine, and division director of Infectious Diseases, was co-author on the study.
CMCB opens doors to new antibiotic discoveries
Using the High Throughput Screening Lab (HTS) in the Centre for Microbial Chemical Biology (CMCB), Canadian researchers are opening new doors to the understanding of antibiotic resistance.
Two recent discoveries, published in Chemistry & Biology, provides promise in treating infections in an age of increasing antibiotic resistance. The first involved Justin Nodwell, member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) and Associate Chair, Graduate Education, Biochemistry & Biomedical Sciences, and the second, former McMaster professor Christian Baron, now Professor and Chair at the University of Montreal.
IIDR trainees forge the future of science
Trainees and their mentors celebrated the heart and soul of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) Friday during its second annual Trainee Research Day.
Students presented their innovative research findings during both oral and poster presentations.
Pictured, Trainee Day coordinator Joaquin Ortega, left, views the poster of Andrew Doung during the poster presentations held in the Ewart Angus Centre. For more photos of the day click here.
Embracing resistance
The old adage “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em” is ringing true in an age where antibiotic resistance is rampant.
Justin Nodwell’s lab has discovered that it’s not always best to fight resistance, but embrace it. His lab has revealed that by manipulating a two-step process in the biosynthesis of bacteria, it is possible to control microbial infections clinically, a finding that provides an understanding as to how and when resistance in bacteria is activated.
Study presents possibilities for drug detoxification in chemotherapy patients
Researchers with the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) have made a promising discovery that puts them one step closer to curbing the side effects of chemotherapy treatment in cancer patients.
A new study, published in Chemistry & Biology, has found that non-producer soil bacteria can harbor the biological machinery required to degrade and inactivate anticancer therapeutics.
Terry Fox Foundation gives McMaster researchers $2 million
About $2 million raised from Terry Fox runs is going directly to McMaster researchers trying to harness the power of viruses to kill tumors.
The Terry Fox Foundation gave out $13.4 million to two national research teams – one studying ways to treat acute leukemias and the other researching the ability of oncolytic viruses to kill cancer cells while leaving healthy ones unharmed.
McMaster’s Brian Lichty, Jonathan Bramson and Karen Mossman (members of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research) and Yonghong Wan are part of the Canadian Oncolytic Virus Consortium led by the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute getting $7.5 million of that funding over five years.
Bramson’s team will get $992,000 and Lichty’s team’s share is $950,000.
(Source The Hamilton Spectator).
Biochemistry student wins inaugural Hart scholarship
Chad Johnston felt inspired as he sat in on Michael Hart’s lecture three years ago. Hart, a second-year Master’s student in Justin Nodwell’s lab was discussing his work exploring the use of environmental microbes as sources of biologically active drug leads, an area very close to Johnston’s own research heart.
At the time, Johnston was completing his undergraduate degree at McMaster. Sadly, the next year, Hart passed away from B cell lymphoma, but through a newly established scholarship created in his memory, Johnston is carrying on a similar research quest.
Gift supports IIDR project focused on the elderly
A team of IIDR investigators will study the effectiveness of seniors eating probiotics thanks to seed money from businesswoman and McMaster graduate Suzanne Labarge.
The gift was part of a $10-million donation to McMaster for the Optimal Aging Initiative, designed to provide initial support for projects that will have immediate impact on Canada's aging population.
Royal Society of Canada honours Gerry Wright
Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, has been elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. The designation is considered the country’s highest honour for a scholar in the arts, humanities or sciences.
Wright, a professor of the Department of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences, joins a second McMaster recipient, Gordon Guyatt, a physician and Distinguished University Professor of the Department of Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics.
Trainee Research Day to showcase IIDR's student talent
Within the labs of the 36 investigators of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, more than 400 trainees are helping forge the future of science.
On November 2, 2012, they will have the opportunity to present their innovative work at the second annual Trainee Research Day, to be held at the Farncombe Institute Atrium from 9 am to 6 pm.
From the music scene to the lab
By night he belts out Motown on his sax on the Hamilton music scene; by day he screens for inhibitors of NDM-1 in the Wright lab.
Andrew King, a first-year PhD student in the lab of Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, is adept at both. As a musician he plays in two popular Hamilton bands and as a scientist he is award winning, having recently won a $15,000 Ontario Graduate Scholarship, a merit-based scholarship that encourages excellence in graduate studies.
Tours spotlight research facilities
Federal Health Minister Leone Aglukkaq and David Sweet, MP of Ancaster, Dundas, Flamborough and Westdale, visited the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease (IIDR) on two separate occasions recently to tour the Institute and its laboratory facilities located within the Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Learning and Discovery.
Summertime and the learning is easy
For many undergraduate students affiliated with the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR), when classes end in June, the real learning begins.
This is especially true for the 10 students selected for IIDR’s inaugural Summer Student Fellowships, which provides funding for students to continue to work alongside their IIDR mentors over the summer months.
Ontario government invests in three IIDR projects
Six researchers with the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) have been given an infrastructure boost from the provincial government for cutting-edge laboratory space at McMaster.
The IIDR projects, totaling $1.5 million, are among 14 from across McMaster to be awarded funding under the Ministry of Economic Development and Innovation’s Ontario Research Fund Research Infrastructure Program. The new provincial investment matches federal awards from the Canada Foundation for Innovation over the last year. Ted McMeekin, Minister of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, made the announcement during a visit to McMaster’s campus on Wednesday.
MIRC partners with Biocells Biotech to develop cancer immunotherapy in China
Delegates from the McMaster Immunology Research Centre (Drs. Jonathan Bramson, Jack Gauldie and Yonghong Wan) recently traveled to Beijing and Taiyuan, China for a series of meetings to discuss partnerships to develop cancer immunotherapies in China. These meetings culminated with the signing of a memorandum of understanding that identified Biocells Biotech as MIRC's preferred partner in China. Together, MIRC scientists and Biocells scientists will work to improve Biocells' cancer therapies, including cytokine-induced killer cells and dendritic cells vaccines. Future goals aim to translate novel technologies being developed at MIRC to the Chinese market.
Students' dreams propelled by award
Two McMaster students have been given a confidence boost in their research programs after receiving Master’s Awards from the Canadian Institutes for Health Research.
Not only did Amanda Lee, a first-year Master’s student in Pathology and Molecular Medicine, and Jon Stokes, a PhD candidate in Biochemistry, receive the awards that recognize students with an exceptionally high potential for future research achievement and productivity, they were ranked first and third, respectively, of 135 successful applicants across the country.
Young scientist at home in the lab
Jason Fan grew up at McMaster. As a young child he would come with his father Boguang Fan to McMaster and watch him work in the labs of the Faculty of Health Science’s Gastrointestinal Program. At age three, a passion for science had sparked.
Today, the Grade 11 student from Westdale Secondary School in Hamilton, and winner of the 2012 winner of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research Bay Area Science and Engineering Fair (BASEF) Research Award, is working alongside researchers learning some of the most innovative techniques in science.
Immunity: striking a fine balance
When it comes to the immune system, it’s all about balance. Natural killer cells are important early responders to infection. In the case of influenza, while initially beneficial, these cells can cause damage to the lung if they are active for a prolonged period of time.
Vanier paves way for scientific passion
If you ask what makes her passionate, you may be surprised by the answer. “Soil-dwelling micro-organisms,” she smiles, convincingly.
Because of it, Canada’s future industrial and commercial growth looks promising, which is why McMaster PhD candidate Renée St-Onge, a student in IIDR member Marie Elliot’s lab, is most excited to receive a prestigious 2012 Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship. “More than anything, being awarded the Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship is a tremendous honour and an unparalleled opportunity,” she says. “It will permit me to pursue my passion while contributing to our country’s industrial and economic growth.”
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CIHR provides $3M for immunology research
Five scientists with the McMaster Immunology Research Centre (MIRC) have been awarded $3 million in direct research funding from the Canadian Institutes for Health Research.
Recipients receiving the operating grants include Ali Ashkar, Dawn Bowdish, Charu Kaushic, Karen Mossman, and Yonghong Wan, all from the Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine. Ashkar, Bowdish, Kaushic and Mossman are also members of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research.
Solution for common nail fungus garners attention
Jianping Xu, a member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research and Professor in the Department of Biology, received a best poster award at the 18th Congress of the International Society for Human and Animal Mycology, which took place recently in Berlin, Germany. The poster, that demonstrated a unique approach to one of world's most common nail infections, was among 12 posters recognized from more than 700 presentations .
Vanier winner merges art and science
You may be inclined to call her a scientist, but McMaster PhD student Marisa Azad, winner of a 2012 Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship, considers herself an artist. Whether she is home brushing strokes of paint on a canvas or in the lab synthesizing anti-microbial peptides, she is “creating art; making something magical from scratch.”
Microbiologists clean up at career awards
It’s a sweep for McMaster University microbiologists as winners of the two top career awards presented annually by the Canadian Society of Microbiologists.
Eric Brown, professor and chair, Department of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences, is the recipient of the CSM Murray Award for Career Achievement, which gives national recognition to an outstanding Canadian microbiologist for key contributions to microbiological research.
American Society for Microbiology honors Patrice Courvalin
Patrice Courvalin, M.D., Institut Pasteur, Paris, France, and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research Scientific Advisory Board, has been honored with the 2012 BD Award for Research in Clinical Microbiology. This award honors a distinguished scientist for research accomplishments that form the foundation for important applications in clinical microbiology.
Research Plenary celebrates excellence
Several students who work in the labs of members of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research were present at the recent Faculty of Health Sciences Research Plenary, including Robert Gale, a master's student in Eric Brown's lab. Winners of the awards will be announced at the awards ceremony on Wednesday.
Google's search for scholars nets master's student $5,000
Google has identified a McMaster student as one of the most promising young women in Canada's technology field.
The world's most popular search engine and web technology company has awarded master's student Fiona Whelan its $5,000 Anita Borg Memorial Scholarship.
The award includes a three-day trip to Mountain View, California, for the Google Scholars Retreat in June. The retreat offers an opportunity for scholars to attend technology talks on Google products and to network.
Whelan, who studies medical science in IIDR member Dawn Bowdish's lab, is one of only 70 women around the globe and just five in Canada to be awarded the scholarship.
Zinc may shorten colds for adults, but not for kids
An analysis of 17 patient trials comparing oral zinc preparations to placebo found that sucking on the lozenges appeared to shorten the duration of the common cold by about two days. But lead author Dr. Michelle Science, an infectious disease specialist at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children, and graduate student of Mark Loeb, coauthor and member of the Institute for Infectious Disease Research, said the review of the trials involving more than 2,100 patients did not show that using zinc alleviated the severity of symptoms. IIDR member Jennie Johnston was also a coathor of the study.
Click here to read the paper published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal.
Antibiotic resistance flourishes in freshwater systems
The author Dr. Seuss may have been on to something when he imagined that microscopic communities could live and flourish on small specs of dust, barely visible to the naked eye. In fact, such vibrant communities exist – in a material with a Seussical sounding, yet scientific name called 'floc'.
McMaster University researchers have now discovered that floc – "goo-like" substances that occur suspended in water and that host large communities of bacteria – also contain high levels of antibiotic resistance.
The research was led by Lesley Warren, professor of Earth Sciences and Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, both of McMaster, along with Ian Droppo, a research scientist at Environment Canada.
Award supports chair in HIV research
Charu Kaushic, an associate professor in Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine, has been awarded an Applied HIV Research Chair from the Ontario HIV Treatment Network (OHTN), to study heterosexual transmission of HIV in women and the impact of hormonal contraceptives use on HIV susceptibility.
Key to new antibiotics
McMaster University and University of Akron researchers are leading the way in understanding the origins of antibiotic resistance, a global challenge that is creating a serious threat to the treatment of infectious diseases.
Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) at McMaster University, and Hazel Barton, assistant professor of biology at the University of Akron, discovered a remarkable prevalence of antibiotic resistance bacteria isolated from Lechuguilla Cave in New Mexico one of the deepest and largest caves in the world and a place isolated from human contact for more than four million years.
The research was published today (April 11, 2012) in the Journal PLoS ONE.
Infectious disease expert to present Perey Lecture
Adrian Hill, an internationally recognized infectious disease expert from the University of Oxford, will present the 27th D.Y.E. Perey Lecture, the Faculty of Health Science’s oldest, fully-endowed premier lecture.
Titled, “Tropical infectious diseases: from innate immunity to candidate vaccines,” Dr. Hill’s talk will take place on Wednesday, April 25 from 9-10 a.m. in the Health Sciences Centre Rm. 1A1.
Game changes how scientists study outbreaks
An international team of scientists have created an innovative tool for teaching the fundamentals of epidemiology—the science of how infectious diseases move through a population.
The team teaches a workshop annually in South Africa that helps epidemiologists improve the mathematical models they use to study outbreaks of diseases like cholera, AIDS and malaria. The team created a new game as a teaching aid for the workshop and which has proven effective in demonstrating concepts of epidemiology. The game was conceived by Steve Bellan of UC Berkeley and Juliet Pulliam of U. Florida, and implemented by a team of researchers, including Jonathan Dushoff, an associate professor of biology at McMaster and member of the M.G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, and James Scott of Colby College; all four co-authored the paper.
IIDR recognizes promising young scientists
The Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) recognized young scientists with an eye for the innovative during the recent Bay Area Science and Engineering Fair.
Jason Fan, a Grade 11 student from Westdale Secondary School in Hamilton, was the first place winner of the IIDR prize that recognized the best senior project in infectious disease, drug discovery or human health. Fan’s project involved testing ligustrazine, a drug derived from traditional Chinese medicine. He examined if ligustrazine would be a valuable therapeutic for Alzheimer's disease by protecting neurons from cell death caused by oxidative stress. He performed his research under the guidance of Dr. Margaret Fahnestock, Professor, Psychiatry & Behavioural Neurosciences at McMaster University.
Federal Budget supports university research
The federal government committed to provide additional resources to support advanced research at universities in Thursday's Budget, including ongoing and stable support for the work of the granting councils and $500 million in additional money over the next five years for the Canada Foundation for Innovation.
Click here to view the full Budget.
Researchers lead fight on TB
Tuberculosis (TB) infects one-third of the world’s population, making it one of the most devastating infectious diseases.
On World TB Day March 24, McMaster’s infectious disease experts will join the world in emphasizing the urgent need for international TB vaccine development. Established by the World Health Organization, the day commemorates when Robert Koch announced 1882 that he had discovered the cause of tuberculosis, the TB bacillus. At the time of Koch's announcement in Berlin, TB was raging through Europe and the Americas, causing the death of one out of every seven people. Koch's discovery opened the way towards diagnosing and curing TB.
Canada Research Chairs boosts members
Two 
members of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research are among the latest round of Canada Research Chairs announced by Gary Goodyear, Minister of State for Science and Technology.
John Brennan, formerly a Tier 2 Canada Research Chair in Bioanalytical Chemistry, was promoted to a Tier 1 CRC in Bioanalytical Chemistry and Biointerfaces, while anthropologist Hendrik Poinar, Canada Research Chair in Paleogenetics 
had his Chair renewed for a second five-year term.
To read more about their Chairs and research programs, click here.
School closures stop spread of H1N1
Closing elementary and secondary schools can help slow the spread of infectious disease and should be considered as a control measure during pandemic outbreaks, according to a McMaster University led study.
Using high-quality data about the incidence of influenza infections in Alberta during the 2009 H1N1 flu pandemic, the researchers show that when schools closed for the summer, the transmission of infection from person to person was sharply reduced.
“Our study demonstrates that school-age children were important drivers of pH1N1 transmission in 2009,” says David Earn, lead author of the study published in Annals of Internal Medicine. Earn is professor in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics and member of McMaster’s Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR).
A peek at antibiotic development strategies
Microbial genomics as a strategy for developing antimicrobial drugs "failed to deliver" in part because "we don't understand the biology," says Eric Brown, Professor and Chair of Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences and member of McMaster's Michael G. DeGroote Insitute for Infectious Disease Research. His strategy to overcome that impasse involves using antibiotics to "probe biology" and thus learn more about "essential functions" of microbes en route, perhaps, to novel or improved antimicrobials. He spoke during the symposium, "A New World of Academic Antimicrobial Discovery," part of the Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, held in Chicago, Ill., last September.
Cancer drugs help combat antibiotic resistance
Drugs used to overcome cancer can also combat antibiotic resistance, finds a new study led by Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research.
“Our study found that certain proteins, called kinases, that confer antibiotic resistance are structurally related to proteins important in cancer,” says Wright about the study published in Chemistry & Biology.
Semen plays a role in HIV transmission, study finds
More than two decades after its onset, the HIV/AIDS pandemic remains an enormous worldwide challenge; yet understanding how sexual transmission of HIV occurs in men and women remains one of the least understood areas of HIV research, claims Charu Kaushic, an associate professor in Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research.
What’s in a flu shot?
Each year, the World Health Organization sets the flu vaccine content. Three influenza viruses—one influenza A (H3N2) virus, one seasonal influenza A (H1N1) virus, and one influenza B virus—are selected. This decision is made on the basis of a number of factors, explained McMaster University infectious diseases specialist Dr. Mark Loeb, “including surveillance data about circulating strains, how they spread, and whether there is a vaccine virus available that would provide protection against viruses likely to circulate.” For the vaccine to be most effective, he noted, there should be a match between the antigen in the vaccine and the circulating strains in a given season. So does this mean vaccination is a gamble?
(Source: Macleans.ca)
Go Mac Go! Watch Gerry Wright cheer on the Marauders in their quest for the Uteck Bowl against Acadia in Moncton, New Brunswick. Click here to read the McMaster Daily News article.
Public lecture The Genome of the Black Death"
Tuesday, Nov. 15 at 6:30 p.m.
Hendrik Poinar, IIDR member and evolutionary geneticist, will present a public lecture entitled "The Genome of the Black Death" on Tuesday, Nov. 15 at 6:30 p.m. The Science in the City lecture takes place at the Hamilton Spectator Auditorium. To reserve your seat call ext. 24934 or email: sciencecity@mcmaster.ca.
For more information visit Scienceinthecity.
Visiting scientist brings Cuban biodiversity to McMaster
Ricardo Medina Marrero, a professor of Microbiology from Cuba’s Chemical Bioactive Center at the Central University of Las Villas, is visiting McMaster University as a collaborator in the lab of Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research.
Researchers reconstruct genome of the Black Death
An international team—led by researchers from McMaster University's Institute for Infectious Disease Research and the University of Tubingen in Germany—has sequenced the entire genome of the Black Death, one of the most devastating epidemics in human history.
This marks the first time scientists have been able to draft a reconstructed genome of any ancient pathogen, which will allow researchers to track changes in the pathogen’s evolution and virulence over time. This work—currently published online in the scientific journal Nature—could lead to a better understanding of modern infectious diseases.
Funding outfits innovative microbe facility
Michael Surette, a member of the Michael G. Institute for Infectious Disease Research and a Canada Research Chair Interdisciplinary Microbiome Research, has received $727,419 from the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI).
His lab is one of five from across campus to receive funding under CFI’s Leader’s Opportunity Fund. The program invests in state-of-the-art facilities and equipment to attract and retain today's best research talent.
The funding is earmarked for Surette's Laboratory for Interdisciplinary Microbiome Research in Health and Disease, which will be a high capacity Biosafety Level 2 facility dedicated to culturing, characterization and rapid molecular profiling of microbial communities of the human microbiome.
Prepared for Contagion
In the movie Contagion in theatres this Friday, a lethal species-jumping virus spreads rapidly causing sickness and death worldwide.
The premise is not far from reality.
According to Karen Mossman, an associate professor of pathology and molecular medicine at McMaster, the chance of a pandemic occurring is imminent. "The world has faced pandemic outbreaks in the past, including SARS and swine flu," she says. "But with an increase in population density and more people travelling, the chance of a pathogen jumping species and spreading worldwide is more likely than ever."
Antibiotic resistance is ancient
Antibiotic resistance is as old as the mammoth, finds a new McMaster study published today in the science journal Nature.
The findings by Gerry Wright, scientific director of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research and McMaster evolutionary geneticist Hendrik Poinar, show antibiotic resistance is a natural phenomenon that predates the modern selective pressure of clinical antibiotic use.
“Antibiotic resistance is seen as a current problem and the fact that antibiotics are becoming less effective because of resistance spreading in hospitals is a known fact,” said Wright. “The big question is where does all of this resistance come from?”
McMaster receives nearly $2.2-million for oil sands research
Researchers at McMaster have received nearly $2.2-million to examine important environmental processes in Alberta's oil sands, which could help speed up the land reclamation process for one of Canada's largest oil companies.
The project team, led by Lesley Warren, a professor in the School of Geography & Earth Sciences and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, was recruited by Syncrude Canada Ltd. to investigate bacterial sulfur reactions occurring in its composite tailings. Composite tailings are the byproduct of the oil sand extraction process. They are high in alkalinity and salinity, and extremely low in organic matter.
Researchers discover origin of the Black Death
The bacteria responsible for causing the 1348 Black Death, identified as one of the most cataclysmic events in human history, has been identified by a McMaster researcher.
Using a novel method of DNA enrichment coupled with high-throughput DNA sequencing, Hendrik Poinar, an evolutionary geneticist and member of McMaster’s Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, his graduate student Kirsti Bos and collaborator Johannes Krause of the University of Tubingen have discovered that the now-extinct version of the Yersinia pestis bacterium initiated the bug that caused 30-50 million European deaths between 1347 and 1351.
Hand-picked for a mammoth excavation
Hendrik Poinar, an evolutionary geneticist and member of McMaster’s Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research, was among more than 50 scientists hand-picked from around the world to participate in a massive archeological dig in Snowmass, Colorado.
Cited as the biggest dig in American history, scientists raced the clock to unearth as many bones and fossils of animals as possible before a planned reservoir expansion began July 1. The $1-million project was supported by the National Geographic Society, which plans to air a segment on the dig on PBS sometime in 2012. Poinar’s group dug up mastodons, mammoths, ground sloths and horses.
Click here to read about the project in the New York Times or click here to read about the PBS series.
(Photo: Poinar cuts bone samples on site for DNA testing. Image courtesy © Denver Museum of Nature & Science).
A passion for science comes early
Cloning DNAs, running polymerase chain reactions to amplify DNA and learning how scientists are fighting antibiotic resistance at the bench is not a bad summer job for a 15-year-old interested in science.
Jessica Knight, winner of the M.G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) Internship Award, has spent the last six weeks in IIDR scientific director Gerry Wright’s lab, learning all she could about antimicrobial resistance.
“Working in Dr. Wright’s lab has been amazing,” says the Grade 9 student from St. Jean de Brebeuf Catholic Secondary School. “I always knew I wanted to study science but now I know why.”
Young investigator makes budding impression
In the 72 years before her death, G. Jeanette Thorbecke made a mark. At 35, Dawn Bowdish is following closely in her footsteps.
As a result, the assistant professor of Pathology and Molecular Medicine and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research (IIDR) at McMaster was awarded the G. Jeanette Thorbecke Award from the Society for Leukocyte Biology (SLB).
Student discovers key to curb HIV
A 30-year-old McMaster student may hold a key to curbing HIV - a global killer considered one of the worst pandemics in human history.
Sumiti Jain, a PhD student in McMaster researcher Ken Rosenthal’s lab, has successfully identified an optimized a prime-boost vaccine against HIV. Her study presents a strategy that uses an antigen from the glycoprotein spike (or gp41) of the virus, which has proven to prevent HIV infection by blocking and preventing the passage of the disease across the urogenital tract. Importantly, this antigen is highly conserved or shared among HIV strains around the world.
Read more...
Experts weigh in on C. difficile
In the Globe and Mail, infectious disease experts say reining in the use of antibiotics is one of the most important steps in fighting C. difficile. Christine Lee, an infectious disease specialist at McMaster University, however, argues that reducing antibiotic use is not simple, as it can be difficult to determine which patients actually need them and doctors may fear withholding antibiotics could put some patients at risk. “Physicians will have to be educated,” said Lee, who is also medical director of infection prevention and control at St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton. “It’s more challenging than it sounds.”
Read her comments in the Globe and Mail article "Hospitals with C. difficile remain safe".
Students recognized for research excellence
Several students that work within the labs of IIDR members were recognized recently at the McMaster Health Sciences 2011 Research Plenary. The annual event recognizes research achievements of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows.
The mysterious case of the White Nose Syndrome
As they hibernate in dark, frigid caves, a mysterious fungus creeps on them, creating a white patch around their nose, wings and ears. The fungus wakes them early from hibernation, creates starvation, wing damage and a quick death.
To date more than one million bats have perished. Why remains a mystery.
McMaster’s Jianping Xu, an associate professor of biology and member of the Institute for Infectious Disease Research, is collaborating with leading microbiologists across North America to understand the Geomyces destructans fungal disease (or White Nose Syndrome, called such as infected bats have a very white patch around their nose).
Sexually transmitted co-infections increase HIV risk: study
Bacterial and viral sexually transmitted infections can exacerbate HIV replication in co-infected individuals, found a recent study conducted by a Canadian team of researchers and led by Charu Kaushic, associate professor of Pathology and Molecular Medicine and member of the Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research.
“While sexually transmitted infections are associated with increased HIV-1 susceptibility and viral shedding in the genital tract, the mechanisms underlying this association are poorly understood,” said Kaushic about the study that appears online this month in the Journal of Infectious Diseases. “Our research has found that normal response to these infections by the epithelial cells (the cells that line the genital tract) can lead to increased HIV replication in the female reproductive tract.”
McMaster honours Frank Pummer
Dr. Francis (Frank) Plummer, a member of IIDR's Scientific Advisory Board, has received an honorary Doctor of Science degree from McMaster University.
Plummer is scientific director of Canada's National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg, a Canada Research Chair in Resistance and Susceptibility to Infections, and a global leader in HIV/AIDS research.
Study reveals new insight into the function of amyloid proteins
She’s a biologist investigating microbial genomics. He studies protein structures using electron microscopy. Put them together - their research opens doors.
A unique collaboration between Marie Elliot and Joaquin Ortega, members of the McMaster Institute for Infectious Disease Research, is providing new insight into the assembly of ‘amyloids’ – protein aggregates that are associated with neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
Indian superbug spreads to Canada
A drug-resistant superbug that's spreading globally has been found in two Toronto-area people — a woman who went abroad for a controversial MS treatment and a man who hadn't travelled outside Ontario in more than a decade.
The latter case is believed to be the first time the organism, dubbed NDM-1, has been contracted in Canada — a finding a leading infectious disease expert called "alarming."
Julianne Kus, a former PhD graduate of IIDR member Lori Burrows, is the first author of the study published this week in the Canadian Medical Association Journal. The story also includes commentary from Gerry Wright, scientific director of the IIDR.
Read the article on Canada.com or Click here for the CMAJ study.
Love isn’t blind after all
In the prehistoric world of dating, it turns out size really does matter.
Researchers at McMaster University have discovered that female woolly mammoths preferred to be wooed by a much larger, less hairy species of mammoth instead of more diminutive male woollies.
It’s the first time scientists have discovered any interbreeding between the woolly mammoth, which lived in the Arctic tundra, and the Columbian mammoth, which lived further south and was about 25 per cent bigger.
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IIDR Bulletin
- Eric Brown’s seminar guest, Dr. Adam P. Rosebrock, Senior Research Associate with the Donnelly Centre for Cellular and Biomolecular Research at the University of Toronto, is set to give his seminar entitled “Cell Cycle Metabolism: Context dependent biochemistry affects eukaryotic growth and division” on Tuesday, May 28, 2013 in HSC 4E20 from 11:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
- The FHS Research Plenary Awards Presentation takes place Thursday, May 23 in the Jan and Mien Heersink Reading Pavilion (Health Sciences Library, 1st floor). Click here for details.
- Dr. Polly Matzinger will present the 28th Daniel Perey Lecture on June 19 in MDCL-1309 at 10 a.m. hosted by the McMaster Immunology Research Centre. Matzinger is an immunologist who proposed a novel explanation of how the immune system works, called the danger model. Click here to view the poster.
- A McMaster team competing in the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition will host a Synthetic Biology Symposium on May 25 from 2-3:30 pm in MDCL 3020 featuring talks by Nathan Magarvey, IIDR, and Ratmir Derda, University of Alberta. Refreshments will be served. Click here to download the poster.
- The FHS Research Plenary begins this week. This open forum event includes multiple poster and oral sessions from May 14 to 16. Click here for presentation details.
- The IIDR hosted the advisory board of the CIHR Institute for Infection and Immunity last week. The event featured scientific presentations by David Earn, Hendrik Poinar and Dawn Bowdish and included a presentation to Eric Brown, whose term on the board ended. Click here to view photos of the event. (Pictured, Marc Ouellette, Chair of the III, right, thanks Eric Brown, Chair of Biochemistry at McMaster, for his years of service on the III Board.)
- Photos of the 2013 IIDR Annual General Meeting are now online. Click the photo below to view the slideshow. (Pictured from left, Fred Capretta, Joaquin Ortega, Jonathan Bramson and Yingfu Li, members of the IIDR at the annual AGM.)
- The 2013 IIDR Spring Newsletter is hot off the press. To view a copy click here.
- Members of the IIDR and MIRC are invited to the Canadian Institutes of Health Research Institute for Infection and Immunity Advisory Board meeting and networking event at McMaster on Tuesday, May 7 from 4:30 to 6:30 pm in the Farncombe Institute, Health Sciences Centre Rm. 3N4. The event will feature talks by Hendrik Poinar, David Earn and Dawn Bowdish and will be followed by a cocktail and networking reception. Download poster.
- The IIDR Annual General Meeting for IIDR members took place April 24 at the Ancaster Mill. The meeting featured talks by investigators Hendrik Poinar, David Earn, Eric Brown, Joaquin Ortega, Mark Loeb and James Mahony. Stay tuned for photos.
- SAVE the DATE! The third annual Michael G. DeGroote Institute for Infectious Disease Research Trainee Day 2013 will take place Oct. 18 in CIBC Hall in the McMaster University Student Centre. Further details will follow.
- Ylan Nguyen, a PhD student in the lab of IIDR member Lori Burrows, received a competitive Student Travel Award to attend the American Society of Microbiology's 2013 Annual General Meeting this May. Nguyen's research involves the characterization of proteins that control pilus assembly and disassembly, and therefore 'twitching' motility in the bacterial pathogen, Pseudomonas aeruginosa. She is currently funded by a CIHR PhD Studentship, and previously held a Cystic Fibrosis Canada Studentship.
- The 4th annual Faculty of Health Sciences Research Plenary will be held on May 14-16, 2013, with an awards reception on May 27. The deadline for abstract submissions is March 20. Visit the FHS Research Plenary website for abstract submission forms and for additional information about the event.
- IIDR members David Earn and Eric Brown will join other McMaster faculty, students and alumni at TEDx McMaster U's third annual conference on
Sunday, March 3 at McMaster Innovation Park from 9 am to 6 pm. This year's theme is "Eidemic: Thinking Is Contagious." For more information visit the TEDx McMaster U Facebook page.
- McMaster Health Research Services has distributed its current funding opportunities bulletin. To view the bulletin cilck here.
- Photos of the IIDR Holiday Party are posted! Click here to view the photos. The event raised more than $800. Proceeds are supporting the Michael Kamin Hart Memorial Scholarship and City Kids.
- Prof. Brian Coombes comments in the CBC that the strain of E. coli found at high levels in Red Hill Creek is likely the strain that's in everyone's gastrointestinal tract. Click here to read more.
- View the IIDR 2012 Newsletter online copy here.
- Gerry Wright presented the Origins Institute Colloquium Monday, Nov. 5 at 2:30 pm in MDCL 1110. His talk was titled "Origins of Antibiotics and Resistance". Coffee will be served at 2:15pm. Click here for more information.
- Halloween 2012: From Greek Gods and Goddesses to Sperms and Egg, IIDR labs had a spooktacular time Oct. 31. Congratulations to the Brown lab for winning the top prize for best constume. Click here for photos.
- The second annual IIDR Trainee Research Day took place on Friday, November 2, 2012 in the Farncombe Institute Atrium. Click here for more information.
- IIDR member Charu Kaushic and her team are spotlighted in a Hamilton Spectator story about the provincial government's cash infusion into a new contemporary Biosafety Level 3 lab opening this fall in the IIDR. Click here to read the story.
- Jianping Xu, Associate Professor of Biology and member of the IIDR, is featured in a Hamilton Spectator feature on s
ummer projects that have taken academics everywherefrom Hamilton Harbour to across the globe. Click here to read about his project taking place this summer in southwestern China.
- In researching his debut book on antibiotics, Dr. Gerry Wright showcased a screening of "Dr. Ehrlich's Magic Bullet" in his lab. The film is about Paul Ehrlich'
s discovery of Salvarsan in 1909, otherwise known as compound 606 that was the 1st chemical used to treat an infectious disease, in this case syphilis, which at the time was a scourge in Europe. Dr. Wright blogs about it on the McMaster IIDR blog.
- Combating malaria: In 2010, about 3.3 billion people - almost half of the world's population - were at risk
of malaria. Every year, this leads to about 216 million malaria cases and an estimated 655,000 deaths, according to the World Health Organization, which has dedicated April 25 to World Malaria Day. IIDR member Tim Gilberger, a leader in malaria research, says: "Malaria is a major threat to public health, particularly in the world's poorest countries. Our lab is making great strides in finding new ways to combat emerging threats such as parasite resistance to a number of malaria medicines." Click here to read more about Gilberger's research.
- Read how the overuse of antibiotics are causing resistance that could undermine medical advances in the Globe and Mail.
- Gerry Wright presented his work at the AAAS conference in Vancouver. Click here to read and comment on his presentation on the Canada Foundation for Innovation's blog or click here to read about his presentation on the AAAS website.
- The 201
1 IIDR Annual Report highlights the Institute's successes over the past year. Click here to download the pdf.
- The Human Microbiome Journal Club, a bi-weekly meeting where participants present a recent study related to the human microbiome, continues in 2013. Click here for more information on upcoming journal club presentations or contact Matt Workentine at workenm@mcmaster.ca.
- Top 10 - 2011 was a year of scientific milestones at the IIDR, as evidenced by the Deccan Herald which listed two of the Institute's discoveries among its 10 top science news stories of the year. Click here to see what stories made the list.
Click here for photos and videos of the 2011 IIDR Holiday Party.
- Researchers who studied the fate of six species of 'megafauna' over the past 50,000 years found that climate change and habitat loss were involved in many of the extinctions. In an article in Nature, IIDR member Hendrik Poinar cautions that the plight of megafauna could be misleading when applied to modern extinctions of much smaller animals, and even plants. Read the article here.
- Jack Gauldie, IIDR member and director of the Institute for Molecular Medicine and Health and a professor at McMaster University, has been appointed to the Board of Directors of the Ontario Genomics Institute. Click here to read more.
- Hendrik Poinar's study on the Black Death appears on the cover of the prestigious science journal Nature. Click here to view the article.
- Listen to Hendrik Poinar discuss his research into the Black Plague on CBC's Quirks and Quarks.
- A National HIV/AIDS Summit on Sept. 22 in Washington brought together an estimated 150 scientists, clinicians, public health leaders and advocates who helped draw a roadmap for accelerating the field of "implementation science" in HIV. Read more.
- Justin Nodwell asks "What can we possilby hope to discover?" in the most recent IIDR blog post that examines why scientists care about the things they study. Read it here.
- The IIDR received
worldwide coverage for Gerry Wright's and Hendrik Poinar's research into ancient antibiotic resistance including The Scientist, Winnipeg Free Press, Science
and CBC News; and check out Hendrik Poinar's research into the Black Death in the New York Times, The National Post and ABC News online. - A recent study shows redesigning the antibiotic vancomycin can kill some bacteria that have become resistant to it. "Synthesis of the amidinated aglycon is a highly creative and rationally targeted approach to combatting bacterial drug resistance," comments IIDR Scientific Director Gerry Wright in the article in Chemical & Engineering News.
- IIDR member Christine Lee discusses C. difficile in a Jeff Allen Show segment titled "How Do You Protect Yourself From Germs?" Click here for the podcast.
- Lori Burrows, professor of
Biochemistry and Biomedical Sciences and IIDR member, shares her thoughts on C. difficile in the IIDR Blog. Click here to read her entry. - View the July edition of IIDR's monthly e-newsletter. Email vanraay@mcmaster.ca to subscribe.
- IIDR launches The Spark, an online forum for IIDR members on the future of the Institute.
Click here to view photos of the IIDR's Strategic Planning Day held on June 13 at the Paletta Mansion in Burlington.- Federal budget invests in students, research (McMaster Daily News)
- To subscribe to IIDR's new monthly e-newsletter email vanraay@mcmaster.ca. To view the May 2011 edition, click here.
- Research by IIDR investigators Brian Coombes and Ali Ashkar is published in Landes Bioscience.
