Researchers battle against killer disease
Posted on 5 July 2005
Leishmaniasis is caused by infection with single-celled parasites. Some species of Leishmania parasites cause long-lasting skin ulcers, and hundreds of US troops serving in Iraq have already succumbed to the 'Baghdad Boil', as it is known.
The 'visceral' form of the disease, which affects the liver and spleen, is often fatal, and more than 100,000 people, mainly children, die each year, in Africa and the Indian subcontinent. This form of disease is also found in Southern Europe and countries bordering the Mediterranean, affecting people and domestic dogs.
But a new £1.8 million Immunology and Infection Unit, established as a joint initiative by the University's Biology Department and the Hull York Medical School (HYMS), is spearheading efforts in the UK to develop new drugs and vaccines to combat the disease. The Unit's Inaugural Scientific Meeting will be held on Monday 11 July 2005.
What York has done is to bring together two of the major research groups in the UK working to try to understand the parasites and the diseases they cause
Professor Deborah Smith
The two groups in the Unit working on leishmaniasis at York are headed by Professor Paul Kaye, who was previously at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and Professor Deborah Smith, formerly Professor of Molecular Parasitology at Imperial College London.
Professor Smith said "What York has done is to bring together two of the major research groups in the UK working to try to understand the parasites and the diseases they cause. An international consortium has sequenced the genomes of the parasites that cause different types of disease, so this is an exciting time to look for new strategies to combat infection".
Professor Kaye, the Unit's Director, added "The deadliest form of leishmaniasis tends not to affect people in Western countries as much as those whose immune systems are compromised by malnutrition and the effects of poverty. In Mediterranean countries, the people at greatest risk have some form of immunosupression - HIV sufferers are particularly vulnerable to opportunistic infection by these parasites".
As well as working on leishmaniasis, the Unit also focuses attention on other forms of chronic disease, more familiar in the UK, such as Crohn's disease, as well as bacterial infections such as pneumonia. Scientists have discovered how to grow specialized 'dendritic' cells from adult stem cells, and this may provide a new way to treat a broad range of common diseases caused by an over-active immune system.
Notes to editors:
- Leishmaniasis is a fly-borne disease caused by single-celled parasites called Leishmania. There are approximately 2 million cases of leishmaniasis per year in 88 countries worldwide, of which 500,000 are of the potentially fatal form of the disease (visceral leishmaniasis). Although mainly found in developing countries, Leishmania parasites are also found in most countries bordering the Mediterranean, and visceral leishmaniasis is now often associated with HIV infection.
- The genomes of different species of Leishmania are being sequenced by the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute at Hinxton, together with international collaborators, to provide an important resource for research on the diseases caused by these parasites.
- The Department of Biology at York is one of the country's leading centres for research and teaching across the entire spectrum of the biological sciences. Its international research programmes attract £8 million per year of external funding, employ nearly 300 scientists and were rated 5 in the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise. In 2002, it moved into new £25 million laboratories funded by the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council under the Joint Infrastructure Fund programme, with additional support from Yorkshire Cancer Research.
- HYMS is a joint venture between the Universities of York and Hull and the NHS. It admitted its first medical students in 2003 and is consolidating its research base with strong collaborative links in and between the two universities and clinicians in the region.
- The new research unit is a further boost to Science City York. York was recognised as one of Britain's 'Science Cities' in Chancellor Gordon Brown's pre-budget statement on 2 December 2004. This confirmed the Government's continued investment in science and technology to drive forward the UK's position in the global economy.
- The Immunology and Infection Unit's Inaugural Scientific Meeting on 11 July 2005 will be addressed by the University's Vice Chancellor Professor Brian Cantor and the Dean of HYMS, Professor Bill Gillespie as well as Professor Gordon Dougan, of The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Cambridge; Dr David Sacks of the Laboratory of Parasitic Diseases, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases / National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland and Professor Marc Feldmann of the Kennedy Institute of Rheumatology, Imperial College London.