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Chicago’s new
laboratory will focus on the development
of diagnostic, therapeutic and vaccine
products for anthrax (above), botulism,
tularemia, hemorrhagic fever viruses and
bubonic plague. |
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In the midst of a raging
polio epidemic, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt
called the American public into action on behalf of
the more than 50,000 people falling victim to this
devastating and too often fatal infectious disease.
From a nation living with fear, Roosevelt stirred
compassion, generosity, and determination. The results:
A research laboratory funded by philanthropy and a
major medical breakthrough that eradicated polio from
most of the Western world.
Recent events have spotlighted
glaring gaps in our defense against highly contagious
and potentially deadly microbes, both the kind that
emerge naturally and those that could be used for
bioterrorism – a realistic threat in a post-September
11, 2001, world. The anthrax-by-mail scare that followed
9/11’s attacks put the country on alert. Unchecked
growth of West Nile virus and the 2003 SARS epidemic
further stoked people’s fears.
These developments underscore the
need to again unite in deploying the power of science
to make our world safer from potentially deadly infectious
diseases. The cooperative efforts of philanthropists,
scientists, and the American public will be the catalyst
for this fight.
A new, grand-scale initiative
to combat infectious diseases will harness the leadership
of University of Chicago scientists. The National
Institutes of Health has designated the University
as one of eight Regional Centers of Excellence (RCE)
for Biodefense and Emerging Infectious Diseases Research.
Microbiologist Olaf Schneewind will direct the Center’s
cross-disciplinary team of more than 300 Midwestern
scientists to advance disease detection, develop therapies,
and ultimately produce vaccines. The team will focus
on agents that may be attractive to bioterrorists
(anthrax, plague, Ebola, smallpox), as well as diseases
that emerge and proliferate naturally (influenza,
typhoid fever, SARS).
The University of Chicago’s
oversight of and proximity to Argonne National Laboratories
– one of the government’s first science
and engineering laboratories and the largest in the
Midwest – position it for breakthroughs. As
part of the overall defense effort, the NIH has partially
subsidized construction of a new biosafety laboratory
located on the Argonne campus. This lab will support
the RCE team, and its design will enable safe execution
of large-scale research on deadly infectious microbes.
The lab’s location will allow researchers to
take full advantage of Argonne’s unique structural
advantages and powerful technological resources.
The University’s distinguished
history in infectious diseases research is paralleled
by the strength of today’s faculty. The strength
of today's faculty is paralled by
Seminal breakthroughs at Chicago
date back to notable scientist Howard T. Ricketts’s
early-1900s discoveries of the microbes that cause
Rocky Mountain spotted fever and typhus – contagious
diseases that cause damage to the liver, kidney, and
lungs, and can result in deadly infections in up to
50 percent of their victims.
Chicago’s continued strength
in infectious diseases research stems from world-renowned
faculty, whose work is advancing our understanding
of microbial composition, transmission, and infection.
Viral oncologist Bernard Roizman, for example, began
studying the pathogens responsible for herpes simplex
– an enormously complex virus with 84 multifunctional
genes – in the 1960s. It was Roizman who mapped
the herpes genome and cataloged its methods of infecting
host cells. This research laid the groundwork for
his current pursuit of a potential herpes simplex
vaccine – and also for a genetically altered
form of the virus that may treat a deadly form of
brain cancer that affecting 15,000 Americans each
year.
Olaf Schneewind studies the methods
that bacterial pathogens use to infect people, focusing
on the microbes that cause wound and hospital infections
(Staph), anthrax, plague, and diphtheria. His work
has revealed how bacteria adhere to human tissues
and manipulate host cells in order to replicate within
the human body. This powerful knowledge can generate
new treatment and prevention approaches for deadly
infections – most recently, the discovery of
a vaccine that prevents plague.
Time is of the essence in this
urgent initiative against infectious diseases. Even
with funding committed by both the federal government
and the University, philanthropy is critical. Support
for faculty scientific investigators and the advanced,
secure facilities their work requires are timely investments
on humanity’s behalf, now and for decades to
come.
- Schneewind and his colleagues are recruiting
the field’s most accomplished specialists
in infectious diseases and the human immune response
– scientists who have devoted their careers
to eradicating deadly diseases.
- These specialists and the entire research team
require a central, state-of-the-art facility to
generate the best science and technology to produce
drugs, vaccines, and diagnostic devices.
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