Missouri Medical Review Fall 2009 : Page 39Missouri Medical review fall 2009 “This state-of-the-art labortory will enable MU scientists and students to remain at the forefront of pathogen study and will attract world-class researchers to our university,” said George Stewart, PhD, professor and chair of the MU Department of Veterinary Pathology. “The facility was built to the highest standards to ensure the safety of those who work in or around the building.” Mark McIntosh, PhD, professor and chair of molecular microbiology and immunology and director of MU Research Core Facilities, said the RBL is an asset to his department both in terms of recruiting potential faculty members and providing space for current faculty members’ research. For Mike Baldwin, PhD, an as- sistant professor who recently joined McIntosh’s department from the Medical College of Wisconsin, the RBL presents an important opportu- nity to use animal models under bio- logical containment in his research on potent exotoxins from Clostridium botulinium, a microorganism that produces a variety of toxic molecules including botulism toxin. The ad- ditional research space in the RBL also creates available biocontainment lab space in the Bond Life Sciences MU’s new Regional Biocontainment Lab was built with a $13.4 million NIH grant. Center for molecular microbiology and immunology researchers working with retroviruses. Because research on emerging infectious diseases requires a very spe- cialized facility, the strictly controlled RBL is designed with specialized ventilation and waste management systems to protect the researchers and to prevent microorganisms from being disseminated into the environ- ment. The building has its own air supplies, filters, power supplies and decontamination systems. All critical systems are built with backup units. Decoding the language of memory T cells W hen an infection attacks, the body’s immune system sounds the alert, kills the invading germs and remembers the pathogen to protect against contracting the same type of infection again. Exactly how immunological memory develops is a mystery just beginning to be unveiled by Emma Teixeiro, PhD, in an article published in the journal Science. A key finding is that a distinct program generates the memory cells that protect against re-infection. This current work uncovers some of the language that is necessary to start this program, said Teixeiro, assistant pro- fessor of molecular microbiology, im- munology and surgery at the Univer- sity of Missouri School of Medicine. Teixeiro cites vaccination as the most practical example of how to generate cells that remember infec- tions. With a single shot, the body is infected with a small dose of a pathogen, so the next time a body is exposed, it recognizes the invader and fights off the disease. “When the human body is in- fected, T cells recognize the pathogen with a specific receptor and kill the infection,” Teixeiro said. “But once the infection has been cleared, a small number of cells survive. These are the memory T cells.” Teixeiro’s lab used a mouse model to test how communication inside a T cell would affect a body’s ability to fight infection. Two groups of mice — some with normal T cells and others with a mutation in their pathogen receptor — were infected with listeria monocytogenes, a bacterium often associated with food-borne illness in humans. Both groups of mice fought off the infection equally well, but those with the cell mutation were not able to generate memory T cells to protect against future infection due to a disruption in certain signals within the cell. “A person with this cell mutation would not develop memory T cells. If we knew what was necessary to gen- erate these memory cells, we would not need to worry about fighting the same infection over and over again,” Teixeiro said, noting a direction for continued research. “We are cur- rently figuring out which signals are important for memory generation and protection. This is important for improving vaccines and tumor im- munotherapies.” 39 Publication List |
