“Congratulations to the UM researchers who secured CIHR funding for their cutting-edge work in health and well-being,” said Dr. Mario Pinto, UM vice-president, research and international. “This recognition highlights the impact of UM’s innovative health research. These researchers are driving solutions for better health care in Manitoba and globally.” 

Dr. Peter Nickerson, vice-provost (health sciences) and dean of the Rady Faculty of Health Sciences, said the funded projects show the diversity of health research taking place across UM ranging from investigating gut health and HIV/HPV progression to reducing inequities in trail use for urban First Nation and Métis people and examining the interaction of dietary flaxseed with blood pressure medication. 

“The researchers who received project funding are from eight different Max Rady College of Medicine departments, the College of Pharmacy, the Faculty of Education and the Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences,” Nickerson said. “CIHR funding is vital to the research that takes place at UM. And it’s essential in advancing science with provincial, national and global implications.”  

One of the 12 grant recipients is Dr. Inna Rabinovich-Nikitin, assistant professor of physiology and pathophysiology at the Max Rady College of Medicine. She and her team received $1,032,750 over five years to study what could one day lead to new treatments to reduce the risk of heart disease in people with disrupted circadian rhythms.  

Circadian rhythms are 24-hour cycles that regulate changes in the body, including heart rate and blood pressure. When the circadian rhythm is disrupted by things like shift work, poor sleep or jet lag, it has a negative impact on the heart and could lead to heart disease, Rabinovich-Nikitin said.  

“It’s known that shift workers have a 40 per cent higher risk of heart attacks, but we can’t do without shift work, so our research is working to develop treatments to help people with disrupted circadian rhythm, such as shift workers,” said Rabinovich-Nikitin, who is also a researcher with the Institute of Cardiovascular Sciences, a joint St. Boniface Hospital Research and UM institute.  

Rabinovich-Nikitin’s preliminary studies suggest that a disrupted circadian rhythm results in abnormal lipid metabolism and accumulation of lipids in the heart, and this might be the underlying cause of heart failure following a heart attack.  

“The goal of the newly funded project is to determine how circadian genes affect lipid metabolism following a heart attack and to understand how modulation of circadian proteins can improve lipid metabolism and cardiac function following a heart attack,” she said.   

“We know how diet and exercise contribute to one’s health, but circadian rhythm is a neglected area of research. It’s very important to have a normal circadian rhythm, and we’re working hard to better understand its impact on our health.”     

UM CIHR project funding recipients 

Dr. Michel Aliani, professor of food and human nutritional sciences, Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences; principal investigator, nutritional metabolomics research, division of neurodegenerative disorders, St. Boniface Hospital Albrechtsen Research Centre 

Project: The capacity for dietary flaxseed to inhibit the metabolism of antihypertensive drugs 

Grant: $1,189,575 (five years) 

Using state-of-the-art instrumentation, Aliani’s study aims to prove that flaxseed ingested in the diet can interact with drugs that control blood pressure. Data from the study will explain the action of dietary flaxseed in lowering blood pressure and provide important safety data on the interaction of flaxseed in one’s diet with drugs that lower blood pressure.  

Dr. Marissa Becker, professor of community health sciences, Max Rady College of Medicine, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences; director of technical collaborations at the Institute for Global Public Health 

Project: Prioritizing Place in Sexually Transmitted and Blood-Borne Infection prevention in Kenya: Reframing prevention programs through Program Science 

Grant: $975,375 (five years) 

Using a program science approach, Becker and the team will develop a deeper understanding of how physical, organizational, social and relational dimensions of “place” shape ecologies of risk and safety for prioritized adolescent girls and young women (15-24 years), female sex workers and their male sexual partners in Nairobi County, Kenya. This work will generate contextualized knowledge for prioritizing place-based strategies to optimize sexually transmitted and blood-borne infection prevention program coverage and address unmet needs.  

Dr. Lucy Delgado, assistant professor of educational administration, foundations and psychology, Faculty of Education 

Project: The impact of Métis-specific spaces on the health and wellness of Métis women and Two-Spirit/Indigiqueer people 

Grant: $1,017,452 (four years)  

Through data collected as part of a series of gatherings, interviews and qualitative surveys, Delgado’s project will measure the outcomes for Métis women and Two-Spirit/Indigiqueer peoples engaged in Métis-specific spaces and provide a framework for post-secondary institutions in their creation of Métis-specific spaces. The final stage of this project will be an evaluation of the efficacy of the framework when taken up by new institutions. 

Dr. Jason Kindrachuk, associate professor of medical microbiology and infectious diseases, Max Rady College of Medicine, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences; Canada Research Chair in molecular pathogenesis of emerging viruses; researcher, Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba 

Project: Characterization of long-term sequelae and immune signatures in Ebola virus disease survivors from 1976-2014 in the Democratic Republic of the Congo 

Grant: $100,000 (one year) 

Kindrachuk’s study will determine whether long-term health impacts following Ebola virus disease are conserved across geographic locations and what epidemiologic or biological factors might be linked to more severe complications and immune durability. The team will focus on disease survivors from multiple historic Ebola virus disease outbreaks within the Democratic Republic of the Congo and will also examine this through questionnaires and analysis of historical samples.  

Dr. Jonathan McGavock, professor of pediatrics and child health, Max Rady College of Medicine, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences; researcher, Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba 

Project: Honoring Ourselves and the Land – Reducing inequities in trail use for First Nations and Métis people in urban centres in Manitoba 

Grant: $1,266,075 (five years) 

With the help of Elders and Indigenous families, McGavock and his team will deliver and evaluate four main themed urban trail cultural events: 1) Full Moon ceremony walk/ride for girls, women and two-spirited people. 2) Land-based teachings with Elders/Knowledge Keepers. 3) Medicine teachings. The team will work with non-governmental organizations to plant gardens and/or traditional medicines in parks adjacent to the trails. 4) Youth-led teachings about local Indigenous cultures, languages and traditions. 

Dr. Donald Miller, professor of pharmacology and therapeutics, Max Rady College of Medicine, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences; researcher, Kleysen Institute for Advanced Medicine, Health Sciences Centre 

Project: Improving therapeutic outcomes in medulloblastoma through optimizing brain delivery of agents targeting inhibitors of apoptosis proteins 

Grant: $592,876 (four years) 

Miller’s medulloblastoma research will use a method his laboratory has developed and tested to selectively and reversibly open the blood-brain barrier to increase brain and tumour levels of chemotherapeutics and the XIAP sensitizing drugs to allow both radiation and chemotherapeutic agents to kill the tumour cells in the brain more effectively. Using peptides that target cadherin, the team will temporarily loosen the connections between the brain capillary endothelial cells to allow increased delivery of drugs and sensitizing agents to the brain tumour.  

Dr. Thomas Murooka, associate professor of immunology, Max Rady College of Medicine, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences 

Project: Role of mucosal neutrophils in driving HIV/HPV infection and disease progression 

Grant: $1,139,850 (five years) 

Murooka’s project will focus on specific bacteria linked to inflammatory disease in the lower female genital tract and identify the immune cells that further exacerbate this disease process. The team will use an animal disease model to better understand how this inflammatory process increases HIV and HPV infection, with the overall goal of defining why some individuals are more prone to sexually transmitted infections and to test drug candidates that can lower acquisition risk.  

Dr. Liam O’Neil, assistant professor of internal medicine, Max Rady College of Medicine, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences 

Project: Cigarette smoking induced neutrophilic inflammation as a modifiable risk factor for Rheumatoid Arthritis in First Nations 

Grant: $100,000 (one year)  

O’Neil will investigate the way cigarette smoking interacts with the immune system, leading to rheumatoid arthritis. The team believes neutrophils, a common immune cell, are particularly prone to inflammation, leading to abnormal immune responses in people at high risk for rheumatoid arthritis development.  

Dr. Dake Qi, associate professor, College of Pharmacy, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences 

Project: TAAR1 in adipose tissue is a novel therapeutic target to combat atypical antipsychotics (AAPs)-induced metabolic dysfunction via downregulation of MIF 

Grant: $849,150 (five years) 

Qi’s project will investigate how trace amine-associated receptor (TAAR1) downregulates the release of macrophage migration inhibitory factor in fat cells and its impact on metabolic dysfunction induced by the classic atypical antipsychotics (AAP), olanzapine, by utilizing a combination of molecular and cellular biology techniques and physiological animal models. The team believes that TAAR1 agonists will improve the clinical psychiatric treatment with AAPs. 

Dr. Deanna Santer, assistant professor of immunology, Max Rady College of Medicine, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences 

Project: Role of type III interferons in regulating mucosal immunity in a healthy gut versus ulcerative colitis 

Grant: $967,725 (five years)  

Santer will study fresh gut tissues and blood collected from people with or without ulcerative colitis during routine clinic visits. The team will use a combination of their novel human biopsy culture model, 3D “mini-guts” and immune cells to find out exactly how type III interferons (IFN-L) promote gut health but also how IFN-L could dampen the overreactive immune cells causing symptoms.  

Dr. Jarret Woodmass, assistant professor of surgery, Max Rady College of Medicine, Rady Faculty of Health Sciences 

Project: Reverse total shoulder arthroplasty with and without subscapularis repair: Randomized controlled trial evaluating patient-reported and clinical outcomes 

Grant: $455,175 (five years)  

The aim of Woodmass’ study is to conduct a high-quality, randomized trial comparing outcomes of reverse total shoulder replacement (RTSA) with and without subscapularis repair. This ground-breaking study will provide evidence to support or negate the ongoing use of subscapularis repair in RTSA to optimize patient outcomes and manage scarce health-care resources. 

“This excellent showing by our faculty members and their partners in receiving this funding is a testament to the outstanding quality of research conducted at the University of Manitoba,” said Dr. Mario Pinto, UM’s vice-president (research and international). “I congratulate these research leaders, whose work continues to improve the quality of health and patient care here in Manitoba and around the world.”

Project: Anti-Thrombotic Therapy to Ameliorate Clinical Complications in Community Acquired Pneumonia (ATTACC-CAP)

Dr. Ryan Zarychanski and Dr. Sylvain Lother

Dr. Ryan Zarychanski, associate professor of internal medicine, Max Rady College of Medicine and senior scientist at CancerCare Manitoba, and his team received more than $3.9 million over five years.

Building on the knowledge the trial team gained while studying the blood thinner heparin in COVID-19 patients, the Manitoba-led team will conduct a large international adaptive randomized trial that will evaluate whether therapeutic-dose heparin reduces critical illness and mortality in hospitalized patients with non-COVID pneumonia.

“This is the first large international trial to be wholly managed by the University of Manitoba and will provide unique training opportunities to junior faculty like co-principal investigator Dr. Sylvain Lother,” said Zarychanski, UM Lyonel G. Israels Research Chair in Hematology. “It will also showcase UM’s clinical trial management and data coordination capacity at the George and Fay Yee Centre for Healthcare Innovation.”

Project: Regulation of Programmed Necrosis in the Heart

Dr. Lorrie Kirshenbaum

Dr. Lorrie Kirshenbaum, UM Canada Research Chair in molecular cardiology and professor of physiology & pathophysiology and pharmacology & therapeutics, Max Rady College of Medicine, and his team received $1.1 million over five years.

The study will focus on the role of mitochondrial-regulated cell death programs and how they integrate at the cellular level to cause heart failure. The study will look at the mechanisms underlying doxorubicin (a chemotherapy drug) cardiotoxicity. It will also explore the relationship between cell death and other cardiovascular diseases, such as heart attack, known to cause heart failure.

“The studies are highly innovative and clinically relevant, as many of the concepts and avenues of research have not been previously explored,” said Kirshenbaum, director of the Institute of Cardiovascular Sciences, St. Boniface Hospital Albrechtsen Research Centre. “I am particularly excited about commencing this research and hopeful it will be translated into new drug discoveries that will reduce the incidence of heart failure and improve the quality of life of cancer patients and individuals following heart attack or other human diseases where cell death is known to play a major role.”

Project: Understanding the cellular mechanisms that drive clonal T cell expansion of the HIV reservoir

Dr. Thomas Murooka

Dr. Thomas Murooka, associate professor of immunology, Max Rady College of Medicine, and his team received more than $719,000 over five years.

The study aligns with emerging data that a distinct subset of T cells seems to harbour the majority of residual HIV. By understanding why some T cells contain virus and others don’t, it may lead to a more targeted approach to purge this HIV reservoir in T cells. Murooka and his team will use new imaging tools and animal models to identify, track and kill these rare, infected T cells, so that daily drug regimens are no longer required for people living with HIV.

“So far, the HIV cure field has used a sledgehammer approach to eliminate residual HIV infection, with limited success,” Murooka said. “We are developing a more targeted, immunological approach to specifically identify and destroy rare T cells that harbour HIV as a new approach to achieve HIV cure.”

Project: Mechanisms and consequences of senescent beta cell accumulation in Type 1 Diabetes

Dr. Peter Thompson

Dr. Peter Thompson, assistant professor of physiology & pathophysiology, Max Rady College of Medicine, and his team received more than $589,000 over five years.

Thompson’s recent research has discovered that beta cells are not entirely innocent in the process that leads to Type 1 diabetes and some of them may aid and abet the immune attack. In this study, he will explore the “nuts and bolts” of these sick beta cells to determine how and why they arise, and how they may be restored. The research will take him closer to establishing a new early clinical intervention to prevent Type 1 diabetes in people who are at risk.

“Our study is unique in that it is working from a completely different concept of how Type 1 diabetes occurs as compared with conventional wisdom,” Thompson said. “It has generally been assumed that Type 1 diabetes is just an autoimmune disease, where the beta cells are just targets of the immune attack and thus the vast majority of interventional efforts are aimed at restoring the immune system. Until recently, very little attention was paid to processes operating in beta cells that might contribute. So our work is operating from a different point of view – which is that some beta cells actually promote the immune attack, leading to Type 1 diabetes. This is a major paradigm shift in how we understand the disease with implications for developing new therapies and we are now poised to make exciting progress in this area.”

Project: Confronting Homophobia in Anal Health: Community-based Program Science and HPV among MSM in Nairobi, Kenya

Dr. Rob Lorway

Dr. Rob Lorway, UM Canada Research Chair in global intervention politics and social transformation and professor of community health sciences, Max Rady College of Medicine, and his team received more than $512,000 over three years.

Lorway’s project builds on the University of Manitoba’s extensive Kenyan-Canadian collaboration that has been studying sexually transmitted infections since the 1980s. His team will employ new community-based participatory strategies to identify the risk factors that underlie HPV-related anal diseases among gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men in Kenya. Lorway aims to generate new scientific knowledge related to the clinical, social and epidemiological aspects of HPV infection to inform local sexual health services delivery.

“Although HPV immunization programs in Kenya tend to focus on cervical cancer among adolescent girls and young women, the evidence from this study will enable community health activists and their allied health care providers to advocate for the urgent need to expand immunization to include gay, bisexual and other men who have sex with men,” Lorway said.    

Project: Investigating the molecular and cellular abnormalities of the brain in Rett syndrome

Dr. Mojgan Rastegar

Dr. Mojgan Rastegar, professor of biochemistry & medical genetics, Max Rady College of Medicine, and her team received $100,000 over one year.

The study focuses on the molecular and cellular abnormalities of the brain in a neurodevelopmental disorder known as Rett syndrome. Rastegar and her team will perform side-by-side molecular and cellular research studies to determine the shared anomalies of the human and murine Rett syndrome brains. Her research will further include an investigation of rescue and recovery of the identified Rett syndrome-associated abnormalities, by the application of commonly used drugs in pre-clinical therapeutic studies in animal models of Rett syndrome. 

“Our research results from this project are expected to determine the extent of molecular and cellular damage in the brain of Rett syndrome patients and shared defects with animal models of this disease,” Rastegar said. “Our research may eventually lead to potential therapeutic solutions that are targeted towards commonly impaired characteristics of the brain in Rett syndrome. Our research results may also help to understand the unique characteristics of specific types of MeCP2 mutations for this complex and severe disease. MeCP2 is a protein that binds, reads and interprets genomic modifications.”

The grants are part of a $30-million federal government investment in research infrastructure at 31 Canadian universities through the CFI’s John R. Evans Leaders Fund (JELF), recently announced by François-Philippe Champagne, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry.

Funding provided through JELF helps institutions attract and retain outstanding researchers and acquire cutting-edge tools for innovative work.

“Our UM recipients are pushing scientific boundaries and keeping UM at the forefront of innovation in fields ranging from food science to antiviral immunity,” said UM Vice-President (Research and International) and Distinguished Professor Dr. Digvir Jayas.  

Here’s a look at the projects:

DR. NANDIKA BANDERA

Dr. Nandika Bandara, assistant professor, food and human nutritional sciences, Faculty of Agricultural and Food Sciences; Canada Research Chair in food proteins and bioproducts

JELF grant: $160,000

With new analytical and processing equipment, Bandara’s team will develop novel protein ingredients and protein extraction and processing technologies to help meet the growing demand for sustainable protein products. They will also develop protein polymer-based bioproduct applications.

DR. FUJI JIAN

Dr. Fuji Jian, assistant professor, biosystems engineering, Price Faculty of Engineering

JELF grant: $149,945

Jian’s team will create a world-class grain-drying research lab to address challenges in Canada’s grain handling, storage and export industries. They will test methods of grain drying and develop new methods that take advantage of Canada’s winter temperatures. They aim to refine technologies that dry grain for safe storage while using less energy.

DR. HAGAR LABOUTA

Dr. Hagar Labouta, assistant professor, College of Pharmacy; researcher, Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba (CHRIM)

JELF grant: $160,000

Nanoparticles (super-tiny particles of materials such as gold or iron oxide) have strong potential as carriers for targeted drugs. Labouta, an expert in nanotechnologies, will analyze the behaviour of nanoparticles in the human body. Her lab will acquire new high-resolution tools to examine how nanoparticles bind to cells, proteins and other biomolecules.

DR. CHRISTOPHER PASCOE

DR. TANVEER SHARIF

Dr. Christopher Pascoe, assistant professor, physiology and pathophysiology, Max Rady College of Medicine; researcher, CHRIM

Dr. Tanveer Sharif, assistant professor, pathology, Max Rady College of Medicine

JELF grant: $328,744

Pascoe, who studies lung diseases, and Sharif, who studies brain tumours, aim to understand how the structural complexity of lung and tumour microenvironments contributes to disease progression. They will acquire “digital spatial profiler” technology to examine relationships between cell-specific RNA profiles and structural changes that occur in chronic disease.

DR. ELHAM SALIMI

Dr. Elham Salimi, assistant professor, electrical and computer engineering, Price Faculty of Engineering

JELF grant: $159,731      

Salimi uses electrical analysis techniques integrated into microfluidics to develop rapid, low-cost, portable “lab-on-a-chip” devices for medical diagnostic testing and biopharmaceutical applications. With new equipment for device fabrication, electronic measurement and cell culturing, Salimi’s team will advance these point-of-care technologies.

DR. DEANNA SANTER

DR. THOMAS MUROOKA

Dr. Deanna Santer, assistant professor, immunology, Max Rady College of Medicine; GSK Endowed Research Chair in immunobiology of infectious diseases; researcher, CHRIM

Dr. Thomas Murooka, assistant professor, immunology and medical microbiology, Max Rady College of Medicine

JELF grant: $344,376

Santer and Murooka study the immune response to viruses such as HIV, influenza and the virus that causes COVID-19. They will use cutting-edge technologies, including automated confocal microscopy, cell sorting, gene analysis and mouse models of infection, to better understand the cellular and molecular mechanisms of antiviral immunity.

A ventilator, often used in the intensive care unit (ICU), is a bedside machine that mechanically pushes air into the lungs of a patient who needs help breathing. The COVID-19 pandemic has raised the public’s awareness of the machines’ lifesaving importance.

It’s known that being on a ventilator can injure the lungs because forcing air into them causes stretch and strain.

Dr. Asher Mendelson

But why the process – called mechanical ventilation – can damage organs outside the lungs is poorly understood and needs investigation, said the study’s leader, Dr. Asher Mendelson, assistant professor of internal medicine at the Max Rady College of Medicine.

The research project has received a one-year grant of $100,000 from The Winnipeg Foundation Innovation Fund, which supports cutting-edge, collaborative medical research in the Rady Faculty of Health Sciences.

“I’m thrilled to receive this funding,” Mendelson said. “I think it demonstrates a huge commitment by The Winnipeg Foundation to scientific innovation. For me as an early-career investigator, this is meaningful support that will go a long way in establishing this research program.”

Mendelson’s previous research revealed that the effect of mechanical ventilation could be detected in the smallest blood vessels of the body, called the microcirculation. This was found by using imaging technology to monitor the quadriceps and bicep muscles in ICU patients.

The new study builds on that research. Mendelson’s team wants to know whether mechanical ventilation causes changes to microcirculation outside of the lungs, which could have negative consequences for skeletal muscle and other organs, such as the brain and kidneys.

To test this hypothesis, the team will image blood flow and vascular function in the skeletal muscle of mouse models. They will also look at biomarkers of vascular injury while monitoring the microcirculation of humans who are on ventilators during surgery.

“We’re hoping to identify the process of injury caused by mechanical ventilation, and by doing that, we might be able to devise new strategies that can prevent injuries from happening,” Mendelson said.

Mendelson, who is a critical care physician, said that because of the pandemic, more people must be put on ventilators and it’s more important than ever to understand the systemic effect of this treatment.

“We really have to understand how mechanical ventilation affects not just the lungs, but all organs in the body,” Mendelson said. “Gaining a better understanding of how mechanical ventilation impacts the organs in the body through the vascular system is going to lead to better outcomes for these patients.”

The research team includes Dr. Andrew Halayko, professor of physiology, Canada Research Chair in lung pathobiology and treatment, and research scientist at the Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba (CHRIM); Dr. Abdel Soussi Gounni, professor of immunology and scientist at CHRIM; and Dr. Thomas Murooka, professor of immunology.

“One of the things I’m very proud of is the interdisciplinary team that we’ve put together,” Mendelson said. “We’re all contributing our expertise to the project.”

The teams are two out of seven research groups from across Canada to be awarded funding as part of CIHR’s initiative to better understand the role of the microbiome in human health and disease.

Microbiome in cervical cancer

One Rady Faculty of Health Sciences research team received funding for a five-year project to allow the scientists to perform studies of the vaginal microbiome in cervical cancer to better understand its role in the disease.

“Cervical cancer is one of the most common cancers in women globally, causing more than 250,000 deaths per year and affecting more than half a million women each year,” said co-lead Dr. Adam Burgener, associate professor of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences, and medical microbiology and infectious diseases. “The HPV vaccine is the most effective prevention tool we have against cervical cancer. But for those with advanced disease, where treatment options are more limited, finding new therapeutic interventions that could help existing treatments would be very helpful. We are very excited and grateful for the support from CIHR to help with this effort.”

(Left to right) Dr. Adam Burgener, Dr. Vanessa Poliquin and Dr. Thomas Murooka.

Along with Burgener, the project will be co-led by the Rady Faculty’s Dr. Thomas Murooka, assistant professor of immunology and medical microbiology and infectious diseases, and Dr. Vanessa Poliquin, assistant professor of obstetrics, gynecology and reproductive sciences, and Dr. Roger Paredes, from the IrsiCaixa Institute for AIDS Research in Spain.

The study will investigate whether healthy vaginal bacteria, such as lactobacillus species, or the products they produce, such as metabolites and proteins, are important for slowing the progression of cervical cancer. The project will not only study the microbiome, but also immune responses that are important for clearance of the disease, using the tools of systems biology. Burgener’s team hopes that by examining this ‘cross-talk’ between the immune system and the microbiome it could lead to useful therapeutic interventions.

“The microbiome is very important for the susceptibility to many diseases,” Burgener said. “It is being explored for treatments in disease, including cancer. For example, the absence of some microbial species in the gut have been shown to determine whether certain cancer therapies are effective or not. This is truly remarkable, as it indicates they could act as partners in therapy. It may be that the vaginal microbiome may hold similar potential against cervical cancer, and we hope to find it.”

Co-investigators on the project include Dr. Alicia Berard (University of Manitoba), Dr. Christina Farr (University of Manitoba) and Dr. Melanie Murray (University of British Columbia). Clinical partners working in Uganda include Dr. Lisa Frenkel (University of Washington), Dr. Tom Uldrick (University of Washington), Dr. Carolyn Nakisige (Uganda Cancer Institute), Dr. Constance Namirembe (Uganda Cancer Institute) and Dr. Corey Casper (University of Washington). Dr. Jiafen Hu (Penn State Cancer Institute), Dr. Jake Estes (Oregon Health and Sciences University), Dr. Rafick Sekaly (Case Western Reserve University) and Dr. Alberto Severini (PHAC) are collaborators on the project.

Microbial causes of asthma

The other team, made up of CHILD Cohort Study researchers, received funding for a five-year project to allow the scientists to examine the trillions of microorganisms living inside the human body and uncover the role they play in causing asthma.

“Asthma affects about one in 10 children and it is the most common reason why children miss school or end up in hospital,” said co-lead Dr. Meghan Azad, Canada Research Chair in Developmental Origins of Chronic Disease at the University of Manitoba and a research scientist at the Children’s Hospital Research Institute of Manitoba. “We are truly delighted to receive this funding, which will ultimately help us to improve the lives of Canadian children.”

Dr. Meghan Azad and Dr. Padmaja Subbarao.

The study is co-led by Azad and Dr. Padmaja Subbarao at The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto.

The project, Causational Roles of the Gut Microbiome in Childhood Asthma: Leveraging the CHILD Co-hort Study, will mine the extensive environmental, clinical and microbiome data, and biological samples available from CHILD to investigate how an infant’s genetics, sex and early-life exposures influence the microbiome-immune system co-development. The project will also look at the importance of breastmilk and antibiotics in shaping the infant gut microbiome; the impact of the microbiome on the risk of asthma; and microbiome-targeted interventions for asthma in mice.

“CHILD has shown that breastfed babies have higher levels of beneficial gut bacteria and a lower risk of developing asthma as they get older,” Azad said. “This research will use new technologies to find out how gut bacteria are causing or preventing asthma and the role that early-life exposures, such as breastfeeding, play in modifying those bacteria.”

Launched in 2008 by CIHR and AllerGen NCE, the CHILD Cohort Study (CHILD) is tracking nearly 3,500 Canadian infants and their families, including 1,000 in Manitoba, to help determine the root causes of chronic diseases such as asthma, allergies and obesity. CHILD spans four provinces, involving over 140 multidisciplinary researchers, students and research staff.

Principal Investigators on the project include Dr. Qingling Duan (Queen’s University), Dr. Jeremy Hirota (McMaster University), Dr. Anita Kozyrskyj (University of Alberta), Dr. Wendy Lou (University of Toronto), Dr. Kelly McNagny (The University of British Columbia), Dr. Michael Surette (McMaster University), and CHILD co-director Dr. Stuart Turvey (The University of British Columbia).

Murooka, assistant professor of immunology and medical microbiology/infectious diseases (MMID), and GSK Chair in Immunology and Infectious Disease, was born in Seattle and raised in Vancouver. He earned his B.Sc. in microbiology/immunology at the University of British Columbia where he was especially drawn to the immunology component of his degree, particularly microscopy, and went on to complete his PhD in immunology at the University of Toronto.

From there he moved to Boston to complete a postdoctoral fellowship at the Massachusetts General Hospital, studying how HIV infection changes the way cells move by observing how cells interact with each other in live tissues using a technology called intravital microscopy.

Murooka was able to carry over some of this research when he started at the University of Manitoba Max Rady College of Medicine in 2014, which at the time was the only place in Canada that had a two-photon microscope within a biosafety containment level 2+ for work with HIV infected materials. The close partnerships between the departments of immunology and MMID and the J.C. Wilt Infectious Diseases Research Centre were other draws for Murooka.

“There’s a very strong and unique HIV research group here in Winnipeg, I would argue that it’s one of the strongest in Canada,” he says, “There’s a very strong focus on understanding the molecular and genetic factors that control HIV transmission, clinical epidemiology and various cure and preventative strategies.”

The bulk of Murooka’s research, funded by a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) grant of $573,752 awarded last year, is looking at how HIV is transferred from one cell to another and how communication between cells is affected due to the virus.

As he explains, a crucial component of the immune system is that “cells bump into and talk to each other.” HIV does not have a way of moving so it must exploit this communication and use it “to hitch a ride” from one cell to another. Murooka wants to figure out what mechanisms lead to transmission.

“What is it about these two cells bumping into each other that actually leads to increased HIV spread? Is it just them bumping into each other, or are there actual communications between these two cells that can signal the other cell to become more infected?”

This is one of the components of a five-year CHIR grant recently awarded to a team of researchers across Canada, including Murooka, which make up a consortium called the Canadian HIV Cure Enterprise (CanCure 2.0). Murooka’s lab will also focus on how cell-cell communication affects a phenomenon called latency, where HIV becomes dormant in cells. The goal is to figure out how to completely get rid of HIV in the body by waking up the dormant virus in the cells so that other drugs can eliminate it.

So far the drugs developed for this purpose, called latency reversing agents (LRAs), have been unsuccessful in clinical trials, so this team of researchers is going back to the drawing board.

“If we can understand who harbors the virus and how it can remain dormant, maybe we can reverse it.”

Their plan is to use LRAs along with a combination of other strategies developed by Canadian researchers to try to yield a better result.

Murooka says studies like these are important because while there have been improvements in HIV treatment and prevention, the reality is that people are still getting infected. He hopes his work will contribute to the understanding of what makes the virus so infectious, how it has evolved to be so successful in evading the immune system, and identify certain vulnerable points that can be targeted using drugs.

“It’s going to be a team effort and global effort. If each of us can make an incremental advance, you can advance that collective knowledge to hopefully completely eliminate this virus.”

Murooka is also working with MMID department head Keith Fowke [B.Sc.(Hons.)/88, PhD/95] and obstetrics and gynecology associate professor Adam Burgener [B.Sc.(Hons.)/99, PhD/05] on their recently awarded CIHR team grant on HIV prevention.

The department of immunology will host its 50^th anniversary celebrations on September 26 and 27, 2019. The theme is: Immunology: Translating Creativity into Better Health. For more information, please visit the department of immunology website.

The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) has provided significant funding to two Rady Faculty of Health Sciences professors: Medical microbiologist Dr. Keith Fowke and his team will receive $2 million dollars over five years to investigate how anti-retroviral and anti-inflammatory medications can prevent new HIV infections; and Obstetrics and Gynecology professor Adam Burgener and his team will receive $2 million dollars over five years to investigate how the microbiome in the human body interacts with vaccines and anti-retroviral drugs against HIV.

“I congratulate Drs. Fowke and Burgener on their success in this competitive funding award,” said Digvir Jayas, vice-president (research and international) and Distinguished Professor at the U of M. “Their teams are made up of national and international experts who I have no doubt will make inroads in their investigations, for the benefit of all.”

On July 17, the Honourable Ginette Petitpas Taylor, Canada’s Minister of Health, announced an investment of more than $32 million in sexually transmitted and blood-borne infections research from the Government of Canada, through the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR).

The University of Manitoba has long been at the forefront of HIV/AIDS research, running a collaboration with the University of Nairobi since 1980, significantly advancing the world’s understanding of HIV/AIDS with monumental discoveries such as the virus being transmitted through heterosexual partnerships and from mother to child through breast milk; they also discovered a group of sex workers seemingly immune to the virus, to name just three discoveries.

Fowke’s [BSc(Hons)/88, PhD/95] and Burgener’s [BSc(Hons)/99, PhD/05] new projects continue to uphold this established track record.

Fowke’s project: Combination HIV Prevention: Using anti-retroviral and anti-inflammatory medications to prevent new HIV infections

Co-Principle investigators: Emmanuel Ho (University of Waterloo); Joshua Kimani (Medical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (MMID – U of M and University of Nairobi); Lyle Mckinnon (MMID-UM); Thomas Murooka (Department of Immunology-UM); Julie Lajoie (MMID-UM); Julius Oyugi (MMID and University of Nairobi)

Just as cancer therapy attacks with multiple drugs, this team will employ a combination of biomedical approaches that blocks HIV infections in different ways.

Firstly, they will use anti-HIV drugs that work by blocking the ability of the virus to replicate. Secondly, they will block the inflammatory process that brings the cells that HIV primarily infects into the genital tract using anti-inflammatory drugs. Based on research pioneered by their team members, they have shown that inflammation greatly increases the risk of HIV transmission and can actually nullify the effects of anti-HIV drugs to prevent infections. In one of their pilot studies, for instance, they showed that the anti-inflammatory drug aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid, or ASA) reduces the number of HIV target cells in the genital tract by 35 per cent. They will now further investigate this connection.

Working with a cohort of female sex workers in Nairobi, Kenya who are highly exposed to HIV and are using anti-HIV drugs for prevention, the team will place women with high levels of genital inflammation on the anti-inflammatory drug ASA to assess if the number of HIV target cells in the genital tract is reduced. Meanwhile, in the laboratory, they will use mice with a human immune system to determine the mechanism of how ASA affects the migration of HIV target cells and they will perform HIV infection studies to directly test is ASA can reduce HIV infection.

Finally, because taking drugs daily can be challenging for some people, the team will assess in the humanized mouse model, the long-term goal of using an intravaginal ring that would deliver a contraceptive, an anti-HIV drug, and an anti-inflammatory drug. This proposal will determine if their “Combination HIV Prevention” approach is more effective, thereby providing women with more options for protecting themselves.

Burgener’s project: The microbiome in HIV prevention

Co-Principle investigators: Carolina Herrera (Imperial College, London); Roger Paredes (Irsi Caixa, Barcelona)

Co-Investigators: Vanessa Poliquin (Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences, U of M) and Thomas Murooka (Department of Immunology-UM)

The microbiome has been associated with increased risk of HIV acquisition, but this has not been studied extensively in the context of HIV prevention technologies, such as anti-retroviral based pre-exposure prophylaxis and vaccines. In this study, Burgener and his team will evaluate how differences in the microbiome of genital tract and gut affect host inflammation, the effectiveness of these drugs, and immune responses stimulated by HIV vaccines. These studies may help us to improve these products to make them more effective for HIV prevention.

This project, in collaboration with IrsiCaixa AIDS Research Institute, builds on Burgener’s past work that discovered the effectiveness of an anti-HIV gel known as tenofovir is related to the presence of “healthy” lactobacillus bacteria in vaginal tract, meaning those women who lacked this bacteria gained little or no benefit from the drug.  

“This was a striking result, and made us think that there was some interaction between some bacteria and tenofovir,” Burgener, who is also a Research Scientist with the Public Health Agency of Canada, said at the time.

Burgener’s team was the first to show that vaginal bacteria can impact this class of anti-retroviral drugs, and their efficacy can vary more than three-fold depending on what bacteria are dominant in the person.

This support, through the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, will help Canadian researchers study the full spectrum of health issues affecting the lives of Canadians.

While visiting the university, Eyolfson highlighted the $9.7 million in funding that will go to researchers in Manitoba.

Eyolfson highlighted the work of Dr. Josée Lavoie, a University of Manitoba researcher who works on kidney health care in rural and remote Manitoba First Nation communities. Manitoba First Nations have the highest documented prevalence and the second highest incidence of end-stage kidney disease in Canada. Canadians living in rural/remote locations and requiring care experience significant barriers. Dr. Lavoie will receive $1.5 million to support her research.

“These investigators are all leading experts in their fields. This recognition through the highly competitive CIHR project grants program is testament to the high impact of their research and the investigations these funds will support,” said Dr. Digvir Jayas, Vice-President (Research and International), University of Manitoba.

Other announcements are happening across the country to highlight the diversity and strength of Canada’s health research community. The total amount of funding announced by Minister Petitpas Taylor is $372 million.

U of M projects funded:

Lavoie, Josée G., Community Health Sciences, $1,575,900
Kidney health care in remote Manitoba First Nation communities

Karimi-Abdolrezaee, Soheila, Physiology & Pathophysiology, $1,059,525
Therapies for spinal cord injuries

Driedger, S. Michelle, Community Health Sciences, $864,450
Fostering trust through joint clinical decision making

McKenna, Sean A., Chemistry, $784,125
Investigating the regulatory role of RNA-G4 helicases

Fowke, Keith R., Medical Microbiology, $772,650
Reducing HIV target cells in the female genital tract

Dhingra, Sanjiv, Physiology & Pathophysiology, $749,700
Preserving stem cells in the heart

Hatala, Andrew R., Community Health Sciences, $745,875
Participatory health with Indigenous youth in Canadian cities

Azad, Meghan, Pediatrics & Child Health, $742,050
Breast milk and allergic diseases

Mookherjee, Neeloffer, Internal Medicine/Immunology, $661,725
Regulatory mechanisms in the control of asthma

Murooka, Thomas T., Immunology, $573,750
Understanding how viruses are transported from one cell to another

Sibley, Kathryn M., Community Health Sciences, $443,700
Ensuring health research is incorporated into everyday practice

Slater, Joyce, Food & Human Nutritional Sciences, $393,976
Building Evidence to Inform Policies and Programs for Food and Nutrition Security in Manitoba Youth

Riediger, Natalie D. Community Health Sciences, $359,551
A proposal for introducing a pop beverage tax to combat diabetes

Total amount: $9,726,977