volume xiii, issue iii cimd newsletter inside this issue
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Volume XIII, Issue III
Oct/Nov 2015
Center for Immunology & Microbial Disease at Albany Medical College
CIMD Newsletter Inside this issue:
Annual Retreat 2
Grant Awards 2
Peer-reviewed Publications 2
Conferences, Meetings, and
Study Sections 3
Thoughts to Share 3
Seminars 4
18th Annual Upstate New York Immunology Conference
The 18th Annual Upstate New York Immunology Conference was held October 25-28, 2015 at The Sagamore Resort and
Conference Center in Bolton Landing, NY. The event was attended by over 100 participants and included two keynote speak-
ers, Dr. Kristin A. Hogquist (University of Minnesota) and Dr. Yasmine Belkaid (NIAID/NIH). There were also symposium
presentations, American Association of Immunologists (AAI) Young Investigator Awards and eBioscience Trainee Travel
Awards (given to trainees based on the scientific content of their poster abstracts), short oral poster presentations, a cruise
on Lake George, and several team-building activities.
Financial support was provided by corporate sponsors (including three platinum level sponsors - BD Biosciences, BioLegend,
Inc., and Taconic Biosciences), supporting academic institutions, and an R13 NIH Conference grant.
Next year’s Conference is schedule for October 24-27, 2016 at The Sagamore Resort. Check the website in the Spring for
more information at: http://www.amc.edu/NYIC/index.cfm
Two recent Theobald Smith Lecturers have been elected to the highly prestigious National Academy of Medicine.
Keith Paul Klugman, M.D., Ph.D., director for pneumonia, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle; emeritus William H. Foege
Professor of Global Health, Emory University, Atlanta; and honorary professor, University of the Bitwatersand Respiratory and
Meningeal Pathogens Research Unit, Johannesburg, South Africa
Jean-Laurent Casanova, M.D., Ph.D., investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute; and professor and senior attending phy-
sician, St. Giles Laboratory of Human Genetics of Infectious Diseases, The Rockefeller Institute, New York City.
Election to the Academy is considered one of the highest honors in the fields of health and medicine, recognizing individuals
who have demonstrated outstanding professional achievement and commitment to service.
Theobald Smith Lecturers Elected to the National Academy of Medicine
American Association of Immunologists
Young Investigator Awards
eBioscience/affymetrix
Trainee Travel Awards
CIMD Newsletter
CIMD Annual Research Retreat
Page 2
Metzger DW, Furuya Y, Salmon SL, Roberts S, and Sun K. Limited efficacy of anti-bacterial vaccination against secondary serotype 3 pneu-
mococcal pneumonia following influenza infection. J. Infect. Dis. 212:445-452, 2015.
Zmijewski PA, Gao LY, Saxena AR, Chavannes NK, Hushmendy SF, Bhoiwala DL and Crawford DR. Fish oil improves gene targets of Down
syndrome in C57BL and BALB/c mice. Nutr Res. 35:440-448, 2015.
Nguyen Q-T, Furuya Y, Roberts S, and Metzger DW. The role of interleukin-12 in protection against pulmonary infection with methicillin-
resistant Staphylococcus aureus. Antimicrob. Agents Chemother. 59:6308-6316, 2015.
Barrosa M, Tucker H, Drake L, Nichol K, and Drake JR. Antigen-B cell receptor complexes associate with intracellular MHC class II mole-
cules. J Biol Chem. In press, 2015.
Furuya Y, Furuya AK, Roberts S, Sanfilippo AM, Salmon SL, and Metzger DW. Prevention of influenza virus-induced immunopathology by
TFG-β produced during allergic asthma. PLoS Pathog. 11:e1005180, 2015.
Babadjanova Z, Wiedinger K, Gosselin EJ, and Bitsaktsis C. Targeting of a fixed bacterial immunogen to Fc receptors reverses the anti-
inflammatory properties of the gram-negative bacterium, Francisella tularensis, during the early stages of infection. PLos One
10:e0129981, 2015.
Franz BJ, Li Y, Bitsaktsis C, Iglesias BV, Pham G, Sunagar R, Kumar S, and Gosselin EJ. Downmodulation of vaccine-induced immunity and
protection against the intracellular bacterium Francisella tularensis by the inhibitory receptor FcγRIIB.
J Immunol Res. 2015:840842, 2015.
Ting JP and Harton JA. NLRP3 moonlights in Th2 polarization. Nat Immunol. 16:794-796, 2015.
Reynolds TD, Buonocore L, Rose NF, Rose JK, and Robek MD. Virus-like vesicle-based therapeutic vaccine
vectors for chronic hepatitis B virus infection. J Virol. 89:10407-10415, 2015.
Peer-reviewed Publications
The Center for Immunology and Microbial Disease
held its Annual Research Retreat on August 3, 2015,
at Birch Hill Catering, Castleton-on-Hudson, NY.
This year’s format included short presentations by
faculty member, Dr. Michael Robek, postdoctoral fel-
low, Dr. Julianne Smith, and graduate student, Travis
Walrath. We also welcomed Ph.D. student,
Carolina Chiale Ferreira.
Poster presentations were viewed and feedback was
provided by faculty and postdoctoral fellows.
Lunch was followed by a number of activities including
volleyball, basketball, horseshoes, and board games. Everyone gathered for the yearly CIMD group picture and raffle winners
were presented a variety of prizes.
Grant Awards
Yoichi Furuya, Ph.D., received a one-year, $40,000 Biomedical Research Grant from the American Lung Association for
his research entitled, “Identifying protective immune mechanisms against viral-bacterial co-infections.”
Thomas Andersen, Ph.D., James A. Bennett, Ph.D., and Herbert I. Jacobson, Ph.D., received a three-year, $1,075,420
grant from the U.S. Army Medical Research Acquisition Activity for their work entitled, “Prevention and Treatment of
Breast Cancer.”
Conferences, Meetings, and Study Sections
Edmund J. Gosselin, Ph.D., served on the
National Institutes of Health Vaccines
against Microbial Disease Study Section
in Washington, DC, June 18-19, 2015.
James R. Drake, Ph.D., was invited to
serve as a reviewer for the NIH Immunolo-
gy Fellowship and Academic Research
Enhancement Award (AREA) R15 grant
applications for predoctoral and postdoc-
toral trainees, in Rockville, MD, June 25-
26, 2015.
Kouacou V. Konan, Ph.D., gave an oral
presentation entitled, “Hepatitis C Virus
Requires the Function of Distinct Glyco-
sphingolipid Biosynthetic Proteins for
Genome Replication and Virus Produc-
tion,” at the American Society for Virology
2015 Meeting in Ontario, Canada, July 10
-15, 2015.
Dennis W. Metzger, Ph.D., was invited to
present a lecture on Vaccines at the
2015 AAI Advanced Course in Immunolo-
gy, in Boston, August 7, 2015.
Carlos de Noronha, Sc.D., gave a seminar
at Retropath 2015; 27th Workshop of
Retroviral Pathogenesis entitled,
“Sulforaphane Inhibits HIV Infection of
Macrophages through Nrf2,” in Wolfs-
burg, Germany, August 24-28, 2015.
Dennis W. Metzger, Ph.D., was invited to
serve as a Symposium Speaker and Work-
shop Director at the 1st International
Meeting on Respiratory Pathogens, in
Singapore, September 2-4, 2015.
Jonathan A. Harton, Ph.D., served as the
American Association of Immunologists
(AAI) Committee on Public Affairs (CPA)
representative at the Federation of Ameri-
can Societies for Experimental Biology
(FASEB) Roundtable on Reproducibility in
Research Using Antibodies, held Septem-
ber 10, 2015.
William O’Connor, Ph.D., was invited to
give a seminar in honor of Dr. Richard A.
Flavell entitled, “Gene Regulation and Cell
Signaling in Immunity and Pathophysiolo-
gy,” at Yale School of Medicine in New
Haven, CT, September 10-11, 2015.
Michael D. Robek, Ph.D., chaired the In-
nate Immune Response Session at the
2015 International Hepatitis B Virus
Meeting in Germany, October 5-9, 2015.
Edmund J. Gosselin, Ph.D., served on the
National Institutes of Health Vaccines
against Microbial Disease Study Section
in Washington, DC, October 14-16, 2015.
James R. Drake, Ph.D., served on the
National Institutes of Health Cellular and
Molecular Immunology—Area B (CIMB)
Study Section in Washington, DC, October
15-16, 2015.
Dana R. Crawford, Ph.D., was invited to
give two lectures at the Nutrition Science
Department of Sage College entitled,
“Basic Concepts in Nutrigenomics and
Nutrigenetics,” and “The Future of Nutri-
genomics and Nutrigenetics,” in Albany,
NY, October 22, 2015.
James R. Drake, Ph.D. and Michael D.
Robek, Ph.D., each gave symposium talks
entitled, “MHC Class II Subsets in B-Cell
Biology,” and “Virus-based Therapeutic
Vaccine Vectors to Cure Chronic HBV
Infection,” respectively, at the 18th Annu-
al Upstate New York Immunology Confer-
ence in Bolton Landing, NY, October 25-
28, 2015. Postdoctoral Fellow, Julianne
N.P. Smith, Ph.D., was also invited to give
an oral and poster presentation entitled,
“Type I IFNs Directly Promote Hematopoi-
etic Progenitor Cell Death and Lead to
Bone Marrow Failure in Severe Bacterial
Infection.”
Michael D. Robek, Ph.D., served on the
National Institutes of Health Virology
Study Section—Area B in Washington, DC,
October 29-30, 2015.
Dana R. Crawford, Ph.D., was invited to
give a seminar at the Down Syndrome
Innovations 2015 Conference entitled,
“Dietary Targeting of RCAN1 and Chromo-
some 21 Genes to Treat Individuals with
Down Syndrome,” at the Arkansas Chil-
dren’s Hospital in Little Rock, AK, October
29, 2015.
Dennis W. Metzger, Ph.D., served as Act-
ing Chair for the NIH Special Emphasis
Panel on Adaptive and Innate Immune
Response in Bethesda, MD, November 5,
2015.
Kate C. MacNamara, Ph.D., was invited to
give a seminar to the Microbiology & Im-
munology Department at the University of
Rochester entitled, “Macrophages: Key
Regulators of Hematopoiesis in Disease
and at Steady State,” in Rochester, NY,
November 9, 2015.
Page 3 Volume XIII, Issue III
Congratulations to
Andrea and Yoichi Furuya
on the birth of their son, Kai Marias Furuya,
born July 23, 2015, 8 lbs., 8 oz.
Congratulations! CIMD Annual Holiday Party
REMINDER: Mark your calendars for the Annual CIMD
Holiday Party, being held December 1, 2015 at 6:00 p.m. at
the Albany Shaker Ridge Country Club, in Albany, NY.
If you haven’t already done so, please RSVP to Joanne
George, x25908 or email her at [email protected]
CIMD Seminars
Center for Immunology & Microbial Disease at Albany Medical College 47 New Scotland Ave., MC-151
Albany, NY 12208-3479
Phone: 518-262-6750
Fax: 518-262-6161
Web site:www.amc.edu/research/IMD/
November 9, 2015—2:00 p.m., Huyck Auditorium Dr. Dennis W. Metzger, Host
CIMD Faculty Candidate
Patricia Q. Cortes, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Medicine, Immunology Institute
Mount Sinai School of Medicine
“Insights into the Mechanism of V(D)J Recombination”
November 12, 2015—11:00 a.m., Huyck Auditorium Dr. Wil liam O’Connor, Host
Christian Jobin, Ph.D.
Professor
Department of Medicine
Division of Gastroenterology, College of Medicine
University of Florida
“Microbes and Colorectal Cancer: The Search for a Drug Target”
January 14, 2016—11:00 a.m., Huyck Auditorium Dr. Kouacou V. Konan, Host
Guangxiang Luo, Ph.D.
Professor
Department of Microbiology, School of Medicine
University of Alabama at Birmingham
“Cellular Factors Important for Hepatitis C Virus Infection and Replication in vitro and in vivo”