The News in the Division of Biomedical Sciences
Congratulations to all of the following Graduate Students in the Division of Biomedical Sciences who won awards for exceptional posters!
Cardiovascular/Respiratory Science
First Place - Virgilio Cadete (Supervisor: Dr. Sawicki, Pharmacology)
Genetics/Molecular Biology
Second Place - Emma Turner (Supervisor: Dr. Harkness, Anatomy & Cell Biology)
Imaging
First Place - Hayley Britz (Supervisor: Dr. Cooper, Anatomy & Cell Biology)
Second Place - Tracey MacDonald (Co-supervisor: Dr. Krone, Anatomy & Cell Biology)
Immunology
Third Place - David Kroeger (Supervisor: Dr. Bretscher, Microbiology & Immunology)
Molecular, Physiological & Behavioral Neuroscience
First Place - Landon Baillie (Supervisor: Dr. Mulligan, Physiology)
Second Place - Nikki McLean (Supervisor: Dr. Verge, Anatomy & Cell Biology)
Posted March 04, 2011
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - March 4, 2011
2011-03-02-ME
Researchers at the University of Saskatchewan have discovered, after a two-year investigation, that diets high in carbohydrates are a probable mechanism for the skyrocketing rates of Type 2 diabetes.
Diabetes researcher Kaushik Desai
Photo by Saskatchewan Health Research Foundation
The work by Kaushik Desai and Lily Wu, professors in the U of S College of Medicine's Department of Pharmacology, focused on methylglyoacal (MG), which is produced naturally as the body metabolizes glucose consumed in carbohydrates.
What they have found is that high levels of MG produce all the features of Type 2 diabetes, including damage to insulin producing cells in the pancreas, insulin resistance and impairment of body tissue to use glucose properly. Their findings are set to be published in the March issue of the American Diabetes Association journal Diabetes.
"This is very exciting for us because diabetes is one of the most important health issues in North America," says Dr. Desai.
The researchers' findings come on the heels of the statistic showing that in 2008, 1.66 million Canadians have diabetes, compared to 1.22 million in 2003 - a 36 per cent increase in just five years. By 2010, the number of cases in Canada is expected to be three million with particular concern for Aboriginal people.
Many cases are appearing with no history or genetic cause of diabetes, says Desai, "so it comes down to what we're eating and drinking."
While the high-fat, high-carbohydrate North American diet has always been a suspect in the development of the disease, the underlying mechanisms have eluded researchers until now.
Posted February 16, 2011
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – Feb. 16, 2011
2011-02-07-OTHER
DNA from the stomach bacteria of a young man who died hundreds of years ago is shedding light on movement patterns of North American peoples and when they came in contact with Europeans.
Treena Swanston
University of Saskatchewan researcher Treena Swanston worked with Helicobacter pylori DNA amplified from the stomach tissue of a young man who died between 340 and 160 years ago on a glacier high in the mountains of Tatshenshini-Alsek Park in British Columbia.
Members of the Champagne and Aishihik First Nations, on whose traditional lands he was found, named the site Kwäday Dän Ts'ìnchi, or “Long Ago Person Found.” The individual is estimated to have been 18 or 19 years old when he died. Swanston’s work was undertaken in collaboration with these First Nations.
H. pylori is a common stomach bacteria, present in about half of all people. High levels of H. pylori infections have been identified in the circumpolar region, and Canadian aboriginal communities have been identified by a Canadian Helicobacter study group as a population with the highest risk of developing a Helicobacter-related disease such as stomach ulcers. (An autopsy of the Kwäday Dän Ts'ìnchi individual revealed no sign of this problem.)
Swanston’s analysis of the ancient H. pylori DNA revealed that some of the DNA sequences from its vacA gene are similar to previously published novel sequences associated with Alaskan strains. These are in turn closely related to vacA sequences in Asian strains. This suggests the bacteria travelled with the ancestors of the Kwäday Dän Ts'ìnchi individual as they migrated from Asia to the New World thousands of years ago.
However, Swanston found that some of the ancient H. pylori vacA sequences were similar to sequences in European strains, suggesting European contact.
While DNA from ancient H. pylori has been amplified once before, this is the first time that an ancient H. pylori strain was characterized based on vacA sequence data. Swanston’s work adds to the current research on ancient human migrations, and when different groups came into contact with one another.
Swanston is a post-doctoral fellow in the U of S Department of Anatomy and Cell Biology (College of Medicine) and a sessional instructor in the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology (College of Arts and Science).
The complete research article, entitled “The Characterization of Helicobacter pylori DNA Associated with Ancient Human Remains Recovered from a Canadian Glacier,” will be published online February 16 at the Public Library of Science (PLoS ONE) at http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0016864.
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When the Wuchner family travelled to Calgary for treatment of their 13-year-old, they got the kind of news no one wants to hear.
Their daughter Amanda's brain aneurysm required some kind of treatment "that may become available in the future," her parents were told following an unsuccessful surgery attempt: "Just hope this new technology gets here soon." The drive back to Humboldt in February 2008 was surreal, Amanda's mom Tanya said.
"That was the longest trip of our life, driving back from Calgary to Humboldt, not knowing what was going to happen. But we came home and . . . tried to live our life as normal as we could." For two years leading up to that point, Amanda had been plagued first by headaches -- her worst lasting for 17 days -- and then by neck and back pain that she said was "way worse" than the headaches. When a CAT scan was finally performed on her at Royal University Hospital, it uncovered the aneurysm in her brain, a blood-filled bubble four centimetres in diameter classified as a "fatal problem" if it wasn't addressed.
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