New advanced facilities allow for cutting-edge medical developments

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[img_inline align=”right” src=”http://padnws01.mcmaster.ca/images/Zinkernagel-2.jpg” caption=”Noble prize winner Rolf Zinkernagel in one of the new labs of the DeGroote Centre for Learning and Discovery. Photo credit: Simon Wilson “]Longer and healthier lives with personalized medicines made by manipulating genes to treat disabling and life-threatening chronic diseases such as breast cancer, asthma and rheumatoid arthritis.
The potential to fulfill such promises lies within the Institute for Molecular Medicine and Health which opened today (Friday, Oct. 22) in McMaster University's Michael G. DeGroote Centre for Learning and Discovery (MDCL).

The state-of-the-art 63,000-square-foot facility — an area slightly larger than a football field – on the fourth and fifth floors of the new building means McMaster scientists can bring new treatments discovered in their laboratories to patients' bedsides far more rapidly than ever before.

The institute houses several centres and facilities including:

  • The Centre for Gene Therapeutics, led by University professor Jack Gauldie, which investigates the basic pathobiology and develops new vaccines for both prevention and treatment for inflammatory, infectious and immune diseases. This entails basic investigations to target gene product involvement, creation of vector systems for appropriate delivery of therapeutic genes and rapid translation of promising medicines to the clinical setting.
  • The Centre for Functional Genomics, led by professor John Hassell, which seeks to define the biochemical and biological function of the protein products of the genes. The mission of the Centre is to develop new technologies and to exploit recent advances in gene expression profiling, bioinformatics and proteomics to discover gene function and to integrate this knowledge into genetic pathways that regulate organismal development and physiology.
  • The Robert E. Fitzhenry Vector Laboratory, the first Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) university laboratory in Canada, which is capable of producing vectors for use in clinical trials in patients. Vectors are the delivery agents used to transport new vaccines into a body. GMP is a set of regulations that ensure the identity, potency, safety and purity of pharmaceutical products.
  • The Dr. John Mayberry Histology Laboratory, which prepares tissues to facilitate the examination of the tissue pathology.
  • Facilities for other research in inflammation, cancer, diseases of the lung and gastrointestinal tract and gene therapeutics.

Peter George, president and vice-chancellor of McMaster University, said the new facility will be the site for innovative research which will redefine the possibilities of health care.

“McMaster has a tradition of research success that serves as a launching pad for our future discoveries. The laboratories and facilities in the Institute for Molecular Medicine and Health will propel our scientists to advance our research mission and help enhance the lives of people around the world by bringing innovative medical science into practice in ways that will make real differences in health care.”

The facility and its laboratory equipment is state-of-the-art, but it also has several unique architectural features, including skylights that highlight both the fourth and fifth floors. As well, the new laboratories are an open concept which makes it easier for scientists and students to communicate and collaborate with each other.

“These new facilities place us amongst the very best in the world in being able to move basic science to the bedside as rapidly as possible,” said Jack Gauldie, director of the Institute for Molecular Medicine and Health.

“These fabulous new laboratories and equipment will have a direct impact on our ability to develop new therapeutic interventions in cancer and other chronic diseases. Students, research fellows, scientists and clinicians can discuss basic science, plan clinical studies to relate these basic findings to human disease and implement clinical trials with new approaches in gene based medicine, all within the confines of the new institute.”

A open house to showcase the institute's laboratories, along with a poster session, is being held from 2:30 to 4 p.m. today on the fourth floor.

As part of the opening celebrations, Swiss scientist Rolf Zinkernagel, recipient of the 1996 Nobel prize in medicine, will deliver a keynote address at 4 p.m. in Rm. 1035, speaking on resistance against infectious diseases and vaccine development.

Zinkernagel and his colleague Australian Peter Doherty received the Nobel prize for discovering how white blood cells recognize and kill virus-infected cells. Because of their discovery, a whole generation of immunologists have been able to find new approaches and innovative solutions to immunological problems.

Zinkernagel was a mentor to Ken Rosenthal, professor of pathology and molecular medicine at McMaster, who worked with him at the Scripps Institute in California and at the University of Zurich. “It was an opportunity to study under someone who has been at the cutting-edge of research,” Rosenthal said.