May 2013
Vol. 10 | No. 3
Since August 2004, the MIPnews has tried to keep the grandest department in the university informed and entertained. This issue marks the 100th issue of our heralded ePub. To celebrate this anniversary, here’s a short slideshow of some memorable MIP Newsletter images and jokes that have appeared over our first 100 issues. Click on the image to see the entire article from the newsletter.
MIP Professor Emeritus Earns Teaching Award Congratulations to retired MIP faculty member Dr. Mary Anna Thrall, who currently serves as professor and head of the Department of Pathobiology at Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine, for receiving the 2012 AAVMC Distinguished Teacher Award, the most prestigious national teaching award in veterinary medicine. Dr. Thrall was chosen for her dedication to excellence and student success, as well as leadership in the advancement of the profession. To learn more, see the Ross University News Release Is it just me or are you wondering too whether her office at Ross is as stuffed as her old MIP haunts…… 
Dr. Kelly Santangelo, Clinical Pathologist, has accepted a tenure-track Assistant Professor position with MIP and will join the faculty on July 1, 2013 CMB/MCIN/BMB/MIP Poster Symposium 
The Winners of the 2013 CMB Research Symposium Poster Presentation Awards: Kelly Resmer Charles Hoxmeier Milena Veselinovic, CMB Deanna Dailey, CMB Jordan Steel, CMB Luisa Nieto, MIP Ashley Neff, CMB Claire Birkenhauer, MIP 
Congratulations to the following eight Micro majors who took home awards at the recent Celebrate Undergraduate Research and Creativity Symposium: Highest Honors Keifer Walsh Victoria Frank High Honors Guy Stewart Kaylee Brown Melissa Karres College Honors Julia Cucarola Tyler Dalby Kelly Michie Jonathan Seaman The following MIP undergrads presented posters describing their research at the ‘Celebrate Undergraduate Research and Creativity’ Symposium on April 30th in the Lory Student Center Theater: Veronica Bedford Sarah Born Kaylee Brown Timothy Burton Leah Cody Julia Cucarola Tyler Dalby Katherine Dirsmith Victoria Frank April Freeman Jessica Haugen Madeline Hayes Thomas Hennings Reese Hitchings Melissa Karres Aspen King Wojtek Kuklinski Krista Lockwood Caitin Lozano Alyssa Margolis Kelly Michie Jonathan Seaman Guy Stewart Michael Snyder Mindi Thurmon Keifer Walsh 
40 Years of Service Terry Spraker 35 Years of Service Bob Ellis 30 Years of Service Glenda Allen 25 Years of Service Patricia Cole 15 Years of Service Dean Crick 10 Years of Service Kerry Brookman 
Britta Wood, MS, PhD Program, defended her dissertation entitled, "Cytokines, Antibodies and Plasma Viremia of Cats Infected with Feline Immunodeficiency Virus" on March 29. Her advisor is Dr. Sue VandeWoude. Lt. Mike Barnhart, CMB MS Program, defended his thesis entitled, "Commandeering of the Cellular HuR Protein by Alphaviruses Affects the Regulation of Cellular Post Transcriptional Gene Expression" on March 12th. His advisor is Jeff Wilusz. In the News... The Mycobacteria Research Laboratories where highlighted in the March 26th Coloradoan in the article, Fort Collins students get educated on World TB Day John Spencer was highlighted in the February 20th New York Times article, Fast New Test Holds Promise To Halt Leprosy and the March 7th Bloomberg Businessweek News article, "Colorado State University Scientist Unraveling Inner Workings of Leprosy that Still Plagues World"
Estimating Prion Adsorption Capacity of Soil by BioAssay of Subtracted Infectivity from Complex Solutions (BASICS) Christy Wyckoff, Krista Lockwood, Crystal Meyerett-Reid, Brady Michel, Heather Bender, Kurt VerCauteren and Mark Zabel PLoS ONE 8(3): e58630 (published March 4, 2013) Having a hard time getting your kids to wash their hands before dinner? You may want to mention to them that certain types of the infectious protein-based agent called prions that cause brain wasting are constantly secreted by deer and elk into the dirt in our region. These prions bind soil components and remain infectious for years. So just ask them if they want to make ‘good choices’ and wash their hands - or would they rather grow up rubbing their hind quarters on fence posts as their brains turn to mush? (Of course you and I know that there’s no evidence that the prions in our area can efficiently infect humans, but you are not obligated to tell the kid with the dirty hands that little tidbit….) It has been known for some years now that prions bind to soil components, in particular clays such as montmorillonite (MTE) (which is not a name for one of the Alps but rather a common smectite clay). The hard part is really how to consistently and quantitatively detect the level of infectious prions in particular soils. Here’s where the Zabel lab decided to get ‘down and dirty’ with a new twist on prion detection. Instead of measuring prions directly, Christy et al compared the ability of Southern Colorado soil and pure MTE to bind and inactivate prions. What they found was that the soil from a prion contaminated ranch in Colorado bound prions well (~800,000 LD50 prion units per gram) while the clay MTE bound prions an impressive ~ 1,000X better. Therefore they outline a nice, fairly quantitative method to assess potential prion loads in soil. In addition, the data suggest that perhaps adding MTE clay to soils might be able to bind and generally inactivate prions, making it a potential bioremediation approach for contaminated soils. So why did we pick this paper by Christy, Krista, Crystal et al as our coveted MIPaper of the Month® for April? There are, of course, three (coincidently just like the number of first names on the author line that all kind of sound the same) reasons. First, the field of prion biology, like any scientific field, is only as robust as the experimental assays used to study it. The subtractive approach to prion assessment outlined in this paper appears to have an edge over other approaches in focusing determinations on the levels of unadulterated, infectious prions in the environment. Second, the potential for the assay to effectively assess remediation approaches for contaminated soil could lead to significant breakthroughs down the road in slowing the cycle of prion infection of animals in our area. Finally, the paper contains both a great, memorable acronym (BASICS) and coins an equally memorable, oxymoron-sounding term ‘sub-clinically ill’ mice. How could these escape the eye of an editor who promotes things like the ‘MIP acronym-prefaced’ words and ‘sub-humorous funny’ tidbits in this newsletter?
Timoshevskiy VA, Severson DW, Debruyn BS, Black WC, Sharakhov IV, Sharakhova MV. An integrated linkage, chromosome, and genome map for the yellow fever mosquito Aedes aegypti. PLoS Negl Trop Dis. 2013 Feb;7(2):e2052. doi: 10.1371/journal.pntd.0002052. Epub 2013 Feb 14. Roehrig JT, Butrapet S, Liss NM, Bennett SL, Luy BE, Childers T, Boroughs KL, Stovall JL, Calvert AE, Blair CD, Huang CY. Mutation of the dengue virus type 2 envelope protein heparan sulfate binding sites or the domain III lateral ridge blocks replication in Vero cells prior to membrane fusion. Virology. 2013 Apr 6. doi:pii: S0042-6822(13)00151-7. 10.1016/j.virol.2013.03.011. [Epub ahead of print] Kapoor A, Simmonds P, Scheel TK, Hjelle B, Cullen JM, Burbelo PD, Chauhan LV, Duraisamy R, Sanchez Leon M, Jain K, Vandegrift KJ, Calisher CH, Rice CM, Lipkin WI. Identification of rodent homologs of hepatitis C virus and pegiviruses. MBio. 2013 Apr 9;4(2). doi:pii: e00216-13. 10.1128/mBio.00216-13. Stoeker LL, Overman EL, Nordone SK, Moeser AJ, Simões RD, Dean GA. Infection with feline immunodeficiency virus alters intestinal epithelial transport and mucosal immune responses to probiotics. Vet Immunol Immunopathol. 2013 May 15;153(1-2):146-52. doi: 10.1016/j.vetimm.2013.01.017. Epub 2013 Feb 8. Wolfe LM, Veeraraghavan U, Idicula-Thomas S, Schurer S, Wennerberg K, Reynolds R, Besra GS, Dobos KM. A Chemical Proteomics Approach to Profiling the ATP-Binding Proteome of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Mol Cell Proteomics. 2013 Mar 5. [Epub ahead of print] Silva EB, Dow SW. Development of Burkholderia mallei and pseudomallei vaccines. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 2013;3:10. doi: 10.3389/fcimb.2013.00010. Epub 2013 Mar 11. Minor C, Kersh GJ, Gelatt T, Kondas AV, Pabilonia KL, Weller CB, Dickerson BR, Duncan CG. Coxiella burnetii in Northern Fur Seals and Steller Sea Lions of Alaska. J Wildl Dis. 2013 Apr;49(2):441-6. doi: 10.7589/2012-09-226. Eisen L, Wong D, Shelus V, Eisen RJ. What is the risk for exposure to vector-borne pathogens in United States national parks? J Med Entomol. 2013 Mar;50(2):221-30. Dhaliwal RS, Kitchell BE, Ehrhart E, Valli VE, Dervisis NG. Clinicopathologic Significance of Histologic Grade, Pgp, and P53 Expression in Canine Lymphoma. J Am Anim Hosp Assoc. 2013 Mar 27. [Epub ahead of print] Thirunavukkarasu S, Plain KM, Eckstein TM, de Silva K, Whittington RJ. Cellular and humoral immunogenicity of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis specific lipopentapeptide antigens. Res Vet Sci. 2013 Mar 27. doi:pii: S0034-5288(13)00079-9. 10.1016/j.rvsc.2013.03.002. [Epub ahead of print] Nofchissey RA, Deardorff ER, Blevins TM, Anishchenko M, Bosco-Lauth A, Berl E, Lubelczyk C, Mutebi JP, Brault AC, Ebel GD, Magnarelli LA. Seroprevalence of Powassan Virus in New England Deer, 1979-2010. Am J Trop Med Hyg. 2013 Apr 8. [Epub ahead of print] Geiss BJ, Wilusz J. Ring around the Ro-sie: RNA-Mediated Alterations of PNPase Activity. Cell. 2013 Mar 28;153(1):12-4. Bertolotti A, Izzo A, Grigolato PG, Iabichella ML. The use of ozone therapy in Buruli ulcer had an excellent outcome. BMJ Case Rep. 2013 Jan 31;2013. doi:pii: bcr2012008249. 10.1136/bcr-2012-008249. North EJ, Scherman MS, Bruhn DF, Scarborough JS, Maddox MM, Jones V, Grzegorzewicz A, Yang L, Hess T, Morisseau C, Jackson M, McNeil MR, Lee RE. Design, synthesis and anti-tuberculosis activity of 1-adamantyl-3-heteroaryl ureas with improved in vitro pharmacokinetic properties. Bioorg Med Chem. 2013 Feb 26. doi:pii: S0968-0896(13)00161-2. 10.1016/j.bmc.2013.02.028. [Epub ahead of print] Ovrutsky AR, Chan ED, Kartalija M, Bai X, Jackson M, Gibbs S, Falkinham JO 3rd, Iseman MD, Reynolds PR, McDonnell G, Thomas V. Co-occurrence of free-living amoebae and non-tuberculous mycobacteria in hospital water networks, and preferential growth of Mycobacterium avium in Acanthamoeba lenticulata. Appl Environ Microbiol. 2013 Mar 8. [Epub ahead of print] Liu CF, Tonini L, Malaga W, Beau M, Stella A, Bouyssié D, Jackson MC, Nigou J, Puzo G, Guilhot C, Burlet-Schiltz O, Rivière M. Bacterial protein-O-mannosylating enzyme is crucial for virulence of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2013 Apr 2. [Epub ahead of print] Ekins S, Reynolds RC, Kim H, Koo MS, Ekonomidis M, Talaue M, Paget SD, Woolhiser LK, Lenaerts AJ, Bunin BA, Connell N, Freundlich JS. Bayesian models leveraging bioactivity and cytotoxicity information for drug discovery. Chem Biol. 2013 Mar 21;20(3):370-8. Mossel EC, Ledermann JP, Phillips AT, Borland EM, Powers AM, Olson KE. Molecular determinants of mouse neurovirulence and mosquito infection for Western equine encephalitis virus. PLoS One. 2013;8(3):e60427. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0060427. Epub 2013 Mar 27. Schwartz AL, Custis JT, Harmon JF, Powers BE, Chubb LS, LaRue SM, Ehrhart NP, Ryan SD. Orthotopic model of canine osteosarcoma in athymic rats for evaluation of stereotactic radiotherapy. Am J Vet Res. 2013 Mar;74(3):452-8. Van Campen H, Davis C, Flinchum JD, Bishop JV, Schiebel A, Duncan C, Spraker T. Epizootic hemorrhagic disease in yaks (Bos grunniens). J Vet Diagn Invest. 2013 Apr 9. [Epub ahead of print] Monello RJ, Powers JG, Hobbs NT, Spraker TR, O'Rourke KI, Wild MA. Efficacy of antemortem rectal biopsies to diagnose and estimate prevalence of chronic wasting disease in free-ranging cow elk (cervus elaphus nelsoni). J Wildl Dis. 2013 Apr;49(2):270-8. Kehl T, Bleiholder A, Roßmann F, Rupp S, Lei J, Lee J, Boyce W, Vickers W, Crooks K, Vandewoude S, Löchelt M. Complete Genome Sequences of Two Novel Puma concolor Foamy Viruses from California. Genome Announc. 2013 May 2;1(2):e0020112. doi: 10.1128/genomeA.00201-12. Wyckoff AC, Lockwood KL, Meyerett-Reid C, Michel BA, Bender H, Vercauteren KC, Zabel MD. Estimating Prion Adsorption Capacity of Soil by BioAssay of Subtracted Infectivity from Complex Solutions (BASICS). PLoS One. 2013;8(3):e58630. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0058630. Epub 2013 Mar 4. Schenkel AR, Kingry LC and Slayden RA (2013) The Ly49 gene family. A brief guide to the nomenclature, genetics, and role in intracellular infection. Front. Immunol. 4:90. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2013.00090 |
The brand spanking new MIP Professional Masters Program (aka Micro MS-B Program) was successfully launched on April 1st (no fooling). For more information on this exciting new department educational offering, check out the Program’s website. 
Seventeen prospective MIP graduate students visited the CSU campus in February; eight candidates visited on Monday, Feb 18th, and eleven visited on Friday, Feb 22nd. Both groups were given an overview of the Graduate program from Dr. Quackenbush, received tours of the Foothills facilities, met with the GEC, and met with individual faculty whose research programs were of interest to them. The students who visited on Monday enjoyed a dinner at Old Chicago with the MIP Graduate Student Organzation. The students who visited on Friday were able to attend the CMB/MCIN/BMB/MIP Poster Symposium and then enjoyed a FAC with faculty and the Graduate Student Organization at The Mayor of Old Town. Saturday morning, they headed up Poudre Canyon for a day of snowshoeing with Drs. Quackenbush, Black, Rovnak and DuTeau. Checkout the Graduate Recruitment Snowshoeing Photo Gallery World ‘TB (or should it be NOT TB) Day’ Activities in MIP 
The Mycobacterial Research Laboratories (MRL) commemorated World TB Day on March 25th by hosting 50-70 students from local high schools. President Tony Frank provided Opening Remarks and Pat Brennan presented a brief history of TB in Colorado as well as the story of TB research in MRL before the students visited several MRL labs on both main campus and foothills campus. 
DVM Commencement & Hooding Graduate Commencement Undergraduate Commencement 
Friday, May 10 
SAVE THE DATE! The Mycobacteria Research Laboratories will be hosting the very first Front Range Mycobacteria Conference this June at the University Center for the Arts. Stay tuned for more information and check out the newly-redesigned MRL website for a link to online registration. 
On the brisk morning of March 16th, MIP'ers Dan Regan, Kelly and Auston Walton, Jeff, Carol, Evan and Gwen Wilusz, and Jim Frantz participated in the Partners Mentoring Youth annual "Sharin O' the Green" 5K Run. Congratulations to all of you for finishing the run and contributing to a great community program. Special thanks to Jim Frantz for coordinating the MIP group! 
In January, Dr. Tawfik Aboellail and Dr. Kristy Pabilonia escorted three veterinary students to Cairo, Egypt. Dr. Aboellail coordinated the experience with Cairo University, his alma mater. Dr. Pabilonia serves as the faculty advisor of the International Veterinary Student Association at CSU. The veterinary students spent time learning about veterinary medicine in Egypt, which included meetings with the faculty of Cairo University and tours of dairy, camel and Arabian horse production facilities. 
Kristy Pabilonia at the Great Pyramid of Giza 
Alaa Eldiin Eissa (Cairo faculty member), Tawfik Aboellail, Edwina Gutierrez and Jenn Perez at the Alexandria library 
Veterinary students April Zander, Jenn Perez and Edwina Gutierrez at Cairo University 
Alex Harvey, an Animal Science major, Microbiology minor, who is currently a student in Pete Justice's MIP302 General Microbiology Laboratory course has created the image below for submission to the Frame My Future Scholarship contest. 
Each letter is written in different media as follows; 
We recently managed to secure significant funding from the central Facilities Management group at CSU for much needed renovations in the Microbiology building. The funding, in the amount of $150,000 will cover replacement equipment on the second, third and fourth floors in the Microbiology common freezer areas. This funding, combined with $182K funding already allocated from the FY12 MIP departmental budget, will give us over $300K to cover the extensive remodeling work needed for these areas. Additionally, we will receive a large credit from the City of Fort Collins for improving our energy efficiency on campus and replacing old, outdated equipment with modern units. The project is ambitious, but will greatly improve the use of office, research and common spaces in Micro. A similar project with smaller scope was successfully completed in the Pathology building, when the freezer room on the ground floor was built. Currently, the shared freezer rooms in Micro are not walled in and not cooled. All freezers are venting large amounts of heat in the hallways surrounding labs and offices, with significant noise. The current walk-in freezers on the second, third and fourth floors are all past their 40-year service life and desperately need to be replaced with new freezers, incubators and coolers. Plans are to install a dedicated mechanical system and cooling unit on the roof. The existing freezer areas will be walled off from the main hallways with secure keycard access. They will be properly ventilated and cooled, which will eliminate the heat and noise in those areas. Additionally, new electrical wiring is being installed to accommodate as many freezers as space allows, and free up additional lab space for researchers. The installation of a new roof for the B wing of Micro was also approved, above and beyond the scope of this remodeling project. The design for the construction has already been drawn up and went through the required third party engineering review and approval process. A bit "thanks" for the tireless efforts of Bill Conn from the CVMBS Facilities group, Tony DeKrey, project manager in Facilities, and Steven Hultin, director in Facilities Management to highlight our project and getting successful approval. 
Check out the Services, Benefits and Prices for DNA Sequencing Services being offered right in our own backyard at the Research Innovation Center's Next Generation Sequencing Core.
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Wisdom doesn't necessarily come with age. Sometimes age just shows up all by itself. 
MIP ‘Harlem Shake’ Challenge We have a first place tie for our MIP Harlem Shake Challenge!!!! Check out the winning entries below: "PRC QUIC Shake" "Mosquito Larvae Harlem Shake"
RIP Margaret Thatcher, former UK Prime Minister, who passed away on April 8, 2013 
"She was like a sister to me" ~Ian Orme
New Grant Awards
MAY 2013
JUNE 2013
Do you have NEWS or PICTURES you would like to share? Send In your ideas or newsworthy items. Contributions make the Newsletter better! |
MIP Newsletter Volume 10, Issue 3, May 2013
MIP Home • CVMBS Home • CSU Home
MIP Publications April 2013
Randall Basaraba, "Immunofluorescent Detection of Glucose and Fatty Acid Transporters", American Diabetes Association, Inc.