Learn Something New Sessions

Encouraging Undergraduate Research: A Mentor's Guide

Larry Aaronson, Utica College

Engaging undergraduate students in a meaningful research experience continues to be an important curricular component of many programs at predominantly baccalaureate institutions.  Undergraduate research programs may be institutional, departmental, or offered on an ad hoc basis by interested faculty members.  Supervision of undergraduate researchers can be a time-consuming and costly endeavor, especially for faculty with heavy teaching loads or at resource-strapped institutions. Nevertheless, this is a beneficial and satisfying experience for both the mentor and students.  The presenter draws on 20 years of experience as a mentor of undergraduate research students to offer a guide for those interested in creating a successful undergraduate research program.  Topics for discussion include recruitment, care and feeding of undergraduate researchers, maintaining a research program on a shoe-string budget, mentorship of undergraduate research as an asset in faculty development, and opportunities for external funding.

Bacteria/Nematode Interactions: Inquiry-Based Studies in Symbiosis

TJ Bliss, University of Nebraska-Lincoln

Nematophilic bacteria “team-up” with insect parasitic nematodes to kill and digest insects. Bacteria/nematode systems can provide provocative models for student investigation of symbiotic relationships. In this “Learn Something New” session I will explain general principles of working with bacteria/nematode systems in an educational lab setting. Specifically, I will demonstrate methods I have used to teach students nematode laboratory techniques, including how to infect insect larvae with insect parasitic nematodes, how to count nematodes, and how to make nematode mortality determinations in the context of biologically relevant questions.

I will also demonstrate extraction of nematophilic bacteria from nematode-infested insect larvae. Photorhabdus luminescens, one species of nematophilic bacteria that can be extracted from these nematodes, exhibits bioluminescence detectable by the naked eye. This species of bacteria is also known to exhibit differential phase expression. P. luminescens in its primary phase is able to support nematode growth and development and is extremely pathogenic to insects. P. luminescens in its secondary phase cannot support nematode growth and development. Both phases exhibit specific, phenotypic characteristics that can be readily tested for in a teaching laboratory setting. I will demonstrate some of these tests and discuss current hypotheses for the evolutionary significance of this phase-switching phenomenon.

Bats: Recently Recognized Sources of Emerging Viruses

Charlie Calisher, Colorado State University

Bats (order Chiroptera, suborders Megachiroptera [“flying foxes”] and Microchiroptera) are abundant, diverse, and geographically widespread.  Bat species (1,116) represent nearly 25% of all mammalian species (>4,600).  These mammals provide us with resources but their importance has been minimized and many of their populations and species are at risk, threatened or endangered.  Some of their characteristics (food choices, colonial or solitary nature, population structure, ability to fly, seasonal migration and daily movement patterns, torpor and hibernation, life span, roosting behaviors, ability to echolocate, virus susceptibility) make them suitable hosts of viruses and other disease agents.  Bats of certain species are long recognized as being capable of transmitting Rabies virus but recent observations of outbreaks and epidemics of newly recognized human and livestock diseases (i.e., Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus, Nipah encephalitis, and Hendra disease viruses and now, perhaps Marburg virus and ebolaviruses) caused by viruses transmitted by bats have drawn attention anew to these remarkable mammals.  This presentation summarizes information regarding at least 71 viruses (13 families, 12 genera, 5 unassigned) from bats of at least 77 species.  Clearly, we do not know enough about bats, particularly regarding their role in emergence of viral and other diseases.

Clinical Microbiology Careers - The Future

Judy A. Daly, Primary Childrens Medical Center

Clinical Microbiology in the Year 2025...what’s to come in the field of clinical microbiology?  To reminisce about the state of clinical microbiology a quarter century ago – we would discuss the introduction of the Analytab Products bacterial identification system or the first generation Auto Microbic system (AMS, Vitek Systems, Inc.) originally designed for use in the U.S. space program.  As a discipline and profession, clinical microbiology has “come a long way baby” (Virginia Slims, circa 1970), but we have just begun the molecular diagnostics learning curve, and it’s hard to predict just how far we can take this new tool from a technical, practical and economic standpoint.  Interestingly, despite the advance in diagnostic technology, it has been necessary to maintain proficiency at the reference laboratory in “old-school” microbiology skills such as culture, identification, and susceptibility testing of bacteria, fungi, parasites and viruses.  In fact, the rapid advance of molecular diagnostics in the field of clinical microbiology has served to preserve the past as well as ensuring the future of the profession – at least for the next 25 years!

This session will examine the clinical microbiology career.  The availability of employment opportunities (abundant!), the activities of the clinical microbiologists, the job requirements, and how to become a clinical microbiologist will all be discussed.  If you would like to explain to your students what a germ detective does, this is the session for you.

P. aeruginosa Biofilms in Cystic Fibrosis

Daniel J. Wozniak, Wake Forest University School of Medicine

Biofilms, which are communities of microbes attached to surfaces, cost the nation billions of dollars annually due to damage, product contamination, energy losses, and infections. In infections, bacteria within biofilms are resistant to antimicrobial agents and are protected from the host immune response, giving rise to chronic infections that are notoriously difficult to eradicate.  The Gram-negative bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa has become a paradigm organism for biofilm research. P. aeruginosa is an opportunistic human pathogen that can cause life-threatening infections in cystic fibrosis (CF) patients. For reasons that are not entirely clear, the airways of CF patients are susceptible to bacterial colonization. Once colonized by P. aeruginosa, the organism persists for years or decades and is never eradicated. This persistence has been linked, in part, to biofilms.

The Adaptive Faculty Response to Recent Advances and Challenging Concepts in Immunology

Kathleen Jagger, Transylvania University

Jeffrey J. Sich, Maryville University

Understanding the molecular and cellular basis of the immune response is challenging to students at almost every level. Immunology can appear to be a bizarre conglomerate of nonsensical abbreviations and new terms and concepts. As a result many of the broad functional aspects of innate and adaptive immunity are lost on students.  To make the process of teaching immunology even more challenging, the field is constantly changing and recent discoveries are finding their way even into the introductory microbiology textbook. In this session we will focus on updates in immunology appropriate for incorporation into an introductory microbiology course. The goal of the session is to review several content areas immunology that are either difficult to teach or which have witnessed significant new discoveries in recent years.   We will also include several alternative approaches to the traditional lecture format that might be effective in enhancing student learning of these concepts. Content areas to be covered include:

• The innate immune response, including recognition of pathogens by Toll-like receptors and advances in natural killer (NK) cell biology
• Protecting mucosal surfaces from infection
• The T cell and tolerance
• Advances in vaccine development for major diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis

HHMI Phage Genomics Research Initiative

Tuajuanda Jordan, HHMI

The Science Education Alliance (SEA; www.hhmi.org/grants/sea) is a new endeavor of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute focused on enhancing science education by networking scientists and educators across the country.  The first project of the SEA is a national experiment entitled the Phage Genomics Research Initiative.  This endeavor targets undergraduate freshmen and sophomores; exposes them to the process of doing science; places the authentic research experience within their curriculum in the form of a research-based laboratory course; and exposes them to techniques used in microbiology, molecular biology, and bioinformatics.  Additionally, faculty are trained in all of the techniques and provided with the resources necessary for successful implementation of the course in a variety of academic settings.  Dr. Jordan will present information regarding the development, implementation, and challenges associated with launching this major initiative and invite feedback from the meeting participants.

Bioinformatics in Courses and Research: Involving Undergraduates in Microbial Genome Annotation

Cheryl Kerfeld, DOE, JGI

The Department of Energy’s Joint Genome Institute (JGI) is developing tools to enable undergraduates to participate in genomics research through microbial genome annotation.  This is part of the JGI’s effort to create The Genomic Encyclopedia of Bacteria and Archaea.  Our goal is to have undergraduate institutions “adopt a microbe” for genome annotation; the experience can be embedded in multiple courses across the life sciences curriculum.  This session will provide ideas about how to integrate annotation into existing courses and the development of research courses that will enable your students to participate.