Every year, the Swiss Foundation for Tuberculosis Research awards the Swiss TB Award for outstanding work by Swiss researchers.
The two winners this year are Nina T. Odermatt from the EPFL Lausanne and Tobias Broger from the Swiss non-profit organisation FIND.
New generation urine test improves TB diagnosis in people living with HIV
The Fujifilm SILVAMP TB LAM test, or FujiLAM, is the first of a new generation of rapid diagnostic tests for the identification of TB in people co-infected with HIV. Working in a similar way to a pregnancy test, FujiLAM detects low concentrations of lipoarabinomannan (LAM) in the urine of people with TB and HIV co-infection. Urine samples are easy to collect from people of all ages, which is especially relevant for those with HIV who may often face difficulties in producing sputum (the usual sample needed for TB tests). FujiLAM has shown promise following an encouraging diagnostic accuracy evaluation using biobanked (frozen) urine samples from hospitalized patients with HIV, and these findings were presented in a study published in the journal Lancet Infectious Diseases. The study found that the test is substantially (28%) more effective at identifying TB in people who are HIV positive than the only existing alternative urine test. Rapid and accurate diagnosis of TB is critical to enable patients to start treatment on time, reduce deaths due to TB, and prevent further transmission of the disease. The test is now being evaluated in large studies in more than ten countries, which will help to generate the data needed for evaluation by the World Health Organization (WHO).
SILVAMP TB LAM was developed by a FIND-led international R&D consortium including Fujifilm, Rutgers University, the University of Alberta, Otsuka and the University of Cape Town, supported by the Global Health Innovation Technology Fund (GHIT), the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and the governments of Germany, the Netherlands, UK and Australia.
Broger T, Sossen B, du Toit E, Kerkhoff AD, Schutz C, Ivanova Reipold E, Ward A, Barr DA, Macé A, Trollip A, Burton R, Ongarello S, Pinter A, Lowary TL, Boehme C, Nicol MP, Meintjes G, Denkinger CM. Novel lipoarabinomannan point-of-care tuberculosis test for people with HIV: a diagnostic accuracy study. Lancet Infect Dis 2019;19:852–861. doi:10.1016/S1473-3099(19)30001-5.
Broger T, Sossen B, du Toit E, Kerkhoff AD, Schutz C, Ivanova Reipold E, Ward A, Barr DA, Macé A, Trollip A, Burton R, Ongarello S, Pinter A, Lowary TL, Boehme C, Nicol MP, Meintjes G, Denkinger CM. Novel lipoarabinomannan point-of-care tuberculosis test for people with HIV: a diagnostic accuracy study. Lancet Infect Dis. 2019;19: 852–861. doi:10.1016/S1473-3099(19)30001-5
École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Global Health Institute, Station 19, 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland.
Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb) has specifically adapted to a lifestyle inside its host cell to remain undetected by the immune system for many years. The exact timing of host-cell entry, dormancy, internal cell division and therefore virulence is crucial for Mtb’s success. An important part thereof is the tight regulation of gene expression, mediated by transcription factors.
Here, we investigated one of these transcription factors, the mycobacterial Integration Host Factor (mIHF). We found that the mIHF protein was present throughout the cycle and was very stable inside the bacterial cell. mIHF was essential for the survival of the pathogen, as Mtb without mIHF could not grow anymore.
Mtb cells with a very low concentration of mIHF showed an aberrant phenotype of elongated cells twice the length as normal, which were not able to divide or form a septum. This protein further bound over 150 times to the DNA, often close to another transcription factor, EspR. While most transcription factors regulate less than ten genes, mIHF strongly affected expression of more than 200 genes, which equals about 5% of all genes in Mtb.
Many of these target genes are part of the DNA synthesis machinery, code for tRNAs important in protein synthesis, or are part of virulence pathways. Strikingly, the genes espACD were the most downregulated ones, themselves important for Mtb’s special secretion system and its high virulence. Overall, the characterization of mIHF added an important piece towards deciphering the complex gene regulatory mechanisms in Mtb.
NinaT.Odermatt, Claudia Sala, Andrej Benjak & StewartT. Cole
Essential Nucleoid Associated Protein mIHF (Rv1388) Controls Virulence and Housekeeping Genes
in Mycobacterium tuberculosis
Nature Scientific Reports 8, 1–14 (2018) DOI:10.1038/s41598-018-32340-2
NinaT.Odermatt, Claudia Sala, Andrej Benjak & StewartT. Cole
Essential Nucleoid Associated Protein mIHF (Rv1388) Controls Virulence and Housekeeping Genes
in Mycobacterium tuberculosis
Nature Scientific Reports 8, 1–14 (2018) DOI:10.1038/s41598-018-32340-2
Press relase: Download: swissaerosolaward_2020_englisch.pdf630.24 kB | Zusammenfassung.Sauvageat_Zeder.pdf144.79 kB
The 10th Swiss Aerosol Award has been presented at the annual conference of the Swiss Aerosol Society November 3, 2020 to Dr. Lukas Durdina (EMPA and ZHAW) for his publications on particulate emissions of a business jet and to Eric Sauvageat (Uni Berne) and Yanik Zeder (Swisens AG) for their work on Real-time pollen monitoring using digital holography.
Dr. Lukas Durdina and his Co-authors first reported particulate matter emissions of a business jet aircraft measured according to a new international emissions standard
Business aviation is a relatively small but steadily growing and little investigated emissions source. Regarding emissions, aircraft turbine engines rated below 26.7 kN thrust are certified only for visible smoke and are excluded from the non-volatile particulate matter (nvPM) standard. Emissions data for small engines are lacking. As the demand for air travel surges, fuel burn from commercial aviation is expected to double in 40 the next 15 years. The fleet is even predicted to grow worldwide by 33% in the next 8 years.
Small plane - low emissions?
Despite the small aircraft size and relatively low fuel burn, the nvPM mass emission rates were up to a factor of 3 higher than previously reported for the Boeing 737 engines. We have shown here that a modern business jet may emit as much nvPM from airport operations as an airliner. The comparison with airliners at cruise altitude suggests that nvPM emissions from a business jet flight may be higher than those of an airliner. Expressed as a per-person burden (assuming 180 airliner passengers and 5 business jet passengers), the nvPM mass emissions are higher by a factor of 72 and the nvPM number emissions are higher by a factor of 24.
This study will serve for the development of emission inventories and the results could also be used in the regulatory framework for assessing the emissions certification requirements of small aircraft turbine engines
Durdina, L., Brem, B. T., Schönenberger, D., Siegerist, F., Anet, J. G., & Rindlisbacher, T. (2019). Nonvolatile Particulate Matter Emissions of a Business Jet Measured at Ground Level and Estimated for Cruising Altitudes. Environmental Science and Technology, 53(21), 12865–12872. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.9b02513
Sunrise above the Falcon 900 EX with the exhaust sampling probe and instruments in place. Photo: Lukas Durdina.
As new real-time pollen monitoring devices emerge, there is a growing need for processing the large amount of measurement data in an accurate and efficient way. Eric Sauvageat and Yanik Zeder develop and validate a new algorithm to classify real-time particle measurements taken by the “Swisens Poleno”. This instrument is currently the only operational pollen monitoring device using digital holography.
To identify and classify the pollen particles measured by the Poleno, the holographic images are first used to separate pollen candidates from other particles based on their general shape. As a second step a machine learning algorithm was developed and trained by inserting known pollen particles in the device. The resulting dataset is then used on the unknown pollen grains to discriminate between the different taxa. This two-step procedure enabled the system to identify and classify 8 pollen types, whereby 6 of them had accuracies greater than 90%. In addition to the classification ability of the device, the authors also investigated the counting accuracy of the Poleno by performing controlled chamber experiments.
(Sauvageat, E., Zeder, Y., Auderset, K., Calpini, B., Clot, B., Crouzy, B., Konzelmann, T., Lieberherr, G., Tummon, F., and Vasilatou, K.: Real-time pollen monitoring using digital holography, Atmos. Meas. Tech., 13, 1539–1550, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-13-1539-2020, 2020)
Press relase: Download: SwissAerosolAward-2019_Giulia-Stefenelli.pdf58.7 kB
Dr. Giulia Stefenelli, PhD of ETH Zürich and researcher at the Paul Scherrer Institute in Würenlingen, has received yesterday in Berne the Swiss Aerosol Award 2019 for her excellent work about biomass burning*.
Giulia Stefenelli and coauthors present herein a new method to model the secondary organic aerosol (SOA) formation from complex emissions with a special focus on biomass burning. Biomass burning emissions from residential combustion are a major source of gaseous and particulate air pollution on urban, regional and global scales.
Here, using smog chamber measurements, the authors estimate the contribution of different precursor classes to the SOA formed during emission aging. They demonstrate that SOA yields of these precursor classes in complex emissions can largely be represented by yields determined using single precursors. For SOA yield calculations, they developed a new box model solved using advanced data science techniques.
This modelling framework may be generalizable for other complex emissions sources, enabling the determination of the contributions of different chemical classes at a level of complexity suitable for implementation in regional air quality models. The authors reveal the most important precursors in biomass burning emissions, and the modelling framework developed can be used to follow the evolution of their oxidation products in the particle phase, allowing a direct comparison with molecular composition measurements using recently developed chemical ionization mass spectrometers.
SOA production by most of these precursors has received little study so far; therefore, data analysis methods developed here suggest directions for future laboratory studies and a clear path for constraining SOA effects and supporting source specific mitigation policies.
*Secondary organic aerosol formation from smoldering and flaming combustion of biomass: a box model parametrization based on volatility basis set.
Giulia Stefenelli, Jianhui Jiang, Amelie Bertrand, Emily A. Bruns, Simone M. Pieber, Urs Baltensperger et al; Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 11461–11484, 2019; https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-11461-2019
Thanks to a generous donation from the Swiss Lung Foundation, every year the Swiss
Aerosol Group (SAG) can award a prize of 5'000 CHF to the best scientific publication
in the field of international Aerosol research, written from within Switzerland.
The prize will be awarded at the annual SAG conference, which takes place in November. The choice of the prize winner will be decided by the Prize Commission. The winner will present the awarded work at the annual conference.
Requirements:
As a rule, the work should come from a Swiss university, clinic or research institute.
The manuscript can be written in German, French or English and must be either accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal or published in a peer-reviewed journal not longer than one year.
The prize goes to the first author.
The application must include:
1) A nomination proposal
2) A curriculum vitae including a list of publications
3) A copy of the manuscript of the published work
The documents must be submitted by the 31st of August, in the year of the SAG conference which takes place in November, to the following address or internet address:
Dr. med. Otto Brändli
President of the Swiss Lung Foundation
Hömelstrasse 15
8636 Wald
contact to Otto Brändli ¦ submit Files
Prize Commission:
Prof. Dr. Beatrice Beck-Schimmer (University of Zurich)
Dr. med. Otto Brändli (President, Swiss Lung Foundation)
Prof. em. Dr. Peter Gehr (University of Bern)
Prof. Dr. Barbara Rothen-Rutishauser (Adolphe Merkle Institute, University of Fribourg)
Prof. Dr. Wendelin Stark (ETH Zurich)
Frau Lara Milena Lüthi MSc (BAFU)
Communication of the prize:
The prize winner will be introduced on the website of the Swiss Lung Foundation, and is requested to write a review article about the subject of the nominated work which will be published in Swiss Medical Weekly (SMW; http://www.smw.ch).
Fribourg/Zürich, 4.7.2016
Download108.25 kB15/07/2016, 16:08
Media Release pd_swissaerosolaward_2018.pdf99.65 kB
GDI engines are many times more dangerous to health than modern diesel vehicles
Award for research into the emission behavior of direct-injection gasoline vehicles (GDI)
This year's Swiss Aerosol Award in the amount of CHF 5,000 goes to Dr. Ing. Maria Muñoz of the Federal Materials Testing and Research Institute Empa. Dr. Muñoz has studied the emission behavior of so-called GDI engines (gasoline-direct injection).
The results are frightening:
The exhaust gases of the investigated vehicles, which are on the rise worldwide, contain up to 17 times more carcinogenic substances than those of modern diesel vehicles.
Press release: Ally-Science_2019_PRESS_RELEASE_20190430.pdf123.46 kB
Real-time data on pollen exposure is available for the first time in Switzerland. This is gathered on the Ally Science app, which has already found widespread use among allergy sufferers.
The already commonly used Ally Science app provides those who suffer from allergies with not only information on pollen exposure, but also now a symptom development report and a more precise symptom survey. As another recent addition, users can also now view the pollen concentration in Biel and Lucerne in real time. Other regions are due to be added.
The Ally Science app was launched in April 2018 by the Bern University of Applied Sciences (BFH) and University Hospital Zurich (USZ) to serve as the core component in Switzerland’s largest ever study into pollen. The app now features brand new functions. The most significant addition has been made possible by the Poleno – a measuring device from Lucerne-based start-up Swisens. It detects the current concentration of pollen in the air of the local surroundings, focusing specifically on the types of pollen most relevant to allergy sufferers. This represents a major breakthrough: The measuring method that had been used until now is based around identifying and counting pollen manually.
Consequently, it takes a couple of days before the measurement results are available.
The Ally Science app shows how much pollen and which types of pollen are currently in the air – initially for the cities of Biel and Lucerne, where a Poleno unit has been installed. Based on the tests so far, Swisens CEO Erny Niederberger is confident "that the devices will deliver high-quality real-time data." The data can be viewed on the app in the form of a map. It also shows the regions in which app users are currently registering symptoms, which can be done quickly and easily by swiping into the app's allergy diary. To allow for a more detailed analysis of symptoms, users are now asked to specify whether their allergy symptoms were experienced indoors or outdoors. Allergy sufferers can use the map to decide whether or not they wish to take preventative measures.
Another useful new feature of the app is a symptom development report for users, which can be exported as a PDF if required for a medical appointment. There is also a development display so users can track their symptoms across the entire year. Users who had been entering data into the app in 2018 will see a second curve indicating last year's pattern. This is hugely valuable for a potential medical consultation, particularly with reference to recommending treatment. Further to this, a link takes users straight to tips for pollen allergy sufferers found on the app from the aha! Swiss Allergy Centre.
Plans for 2020 include offering real-time pollen data for more regions, as well as a personalised pollen early warning indicator. Another reason to start using the Ally
Science app now. After all, the more allergy sufferers record their symptoms regularly, "the more detailed findings can be fed into the early warning system," explains Professor Serge Bignens, Head of the BFH Institute for Medical Informatics.
Ally Science – Pollen study conducted with and in the interest of allergy sufferers The Swiss Ally Science study project is reliant on the involvement of people with allergies. They can record their symptoms using the Ally Science app, which is available in five languages. The data is stored on the secure, user-specific MIDATA platform and incorporated into the pollen study in anonymised form. Around 8000 people contributed more than 24,000 symptom entries during the 2018 pollen season, including information on the frequency of individual symptoms. In the second phase of the project, which is now under way, the inclusion of real-time pollen data facilitates the analysis of links between symptoms recorded and the pollen actually present. The aim of the study is to develop pollen early warning systems and to improve advice and treatment.
For more information and photographs or to download the Ally Science app, visit:
Contacts for questions and interviews:
Ally Science app and MIDATA platform: Professor Serge Bignens, Institute for Medical Informatics I4MI, Bern University of Applied Sciences BFH, Biel,
Allergy study: Professor Peter Schmid-Grendelmeier, Allergy Station, Dermatology Clinic, Zurich University Hospital,
Real-time pollen measurement: Erny Niederberger, Swisens AG, Lucerne,
Ally Science is made possible by the support of the following project partners:
Medienmitteilung: Swiss-TB-Award-2018.pdf87.13 kB29/03/2019, 12:43
Die Schweizerische Stiftung für Tuberkuloseforschung vergibt seit 2002 jedes Jahr den mit CHF 10'000 dotierten Swiss TB Award für herausragende Arbeiten von Schweizer Forschenden. Die diesjährigen Preisträgerinnen sind Frau Kathrin Zürcher und Frau Marie Ballif vom ISPM in Bern mit ihrer soeben in der Zeitschrift Lancet publizierten wichtigen Arbeit über die Bedeutung einer korrektiven Testung der Tuberkuloseerreger auf Medikamentenresistenz auf die Behandlungsergebnisse. Dies hat insbesondere bei mehrfachresistenten (MDR) oder gänzlich resistenten (XDR) Tuberkulosekranken einen entscheidenden Einfluss auf ihr Überleben.
The study, which was published just on the World TB Day 2019 in Lancet Infect Dis, resulted from a large collaborative project between the Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine (ISPM) of the University of Bern, the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute in Basel and the Institute of Medical Microbiology (Swiss National Center for Mycobacteria) in Zurich.
This project was funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation and the US National Institutes of Health. The overarching aim was to compile a Mycobacterium tuberculosis strain collection from HIV co-infected and HIV negative individuals in eight low- and middle-income countries worldwide, and to study the mechanisms underlying M. tuberculosis drug resistance. We reported on the challenges to diagnose and treat drug-resistant TB in resource-limited settings. Inaccurate drug susceptibility tests (DST) leading to inappropriate treatment contributes to the high mortality associated with drug-resistant TB. Local access to accurate and rapid DST of anti-TB drugs is required to improve outcomes in patients with drug-resistant TB.
Drug susceptibility testing and mortality in patients treated for tuberculosis in high-burden countries: a multi-centre cohort study
Kathrin Zürcher , Marie Ballif, Lukas Fenner, Sonia Borrell, Peter M. Keller, Joachim Gnokoro, Olivier Marcy, Marcel Yotebieng, Lameck Diero, E. Jane Carter,…...
Sebastien Gagneux, Erik C. Böttger and Matthias Egger, on behalf of the
International Epidemiology Databases to Evaluate AIDS consortium
Lancet Infect Dis 2019; 19:298-307
Good news from Addis Ababa: It seems there with our commitment after 6 years to succeed, the training program in the hands of our already trained pulmonary doctors (see the photo with Prof. Schluger top right) to pass. As a result, doctors will continue to receive training in this field not only in Ethiopia but also in other countries in the region. We have published the following article in the renowned journal British Medical Journal:
Creating a specialist physician workforce in low-resource settings: reflections and lessons learnt from the East African Training Initiative. Neil W Schluger, Charles B Sherman, Amsalu Binegdie, Tewedros Gebremariam, Dawit Kebede, Aschalew Worku, E Jane Carter, Otto Brändli (Schluger NW, et al. BMJ Glob Health 2018;3:e001041. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2018-001041)
Download PDF: Schluger2018BMJ.pdf197.48 kB24/10/2018, 21:33
Medienmitteilung Download: PD_Swiss-Aerosol-Award_2017.pdf617.69 KB
Der diesjährige Swiss Aerosol Award in der Höhe von CHF 5000 geht an Prof. Reto Auer vom Berner Institut für Hausarztmedizin (BIHAM) und Universitätsklinik von Lausanne (PMU), welcher ein multidis-ziplinäres Team von Toxikologen und klinischen Forschern geleitet hat. In einer wissenschaftlichen Kommunikation, die am 22. Mai in der renommierten amerikanischen Zeitschrift JAMA-Internal Medicine erschienen ist, haben die Wissenschaftler des Instituts für Arbeitsgesundheit (IST – Institut de Santé au Travail) und der Universitätsklinik von Lausanne (PMU – Policlinique Médicale Universitaire) die Ergeb-nisse einer unabhängigen Studie über das elektronische Tabakheizsystem IQOS veröffentlicht.
Philip Morris International (PMI) lancierte vor kurzem den IQOS (I Quit Ordinary Smoking), einen Ziga-rettenhalter, der eine Mini-Zigarette auf 330 Grad Celsius erhitzt. Der Hersteller behauptet, dass IQOS keinen Rauch erzeuge, da der Tabak nur erhitzt statt verbrannt werde und es dabei kein Feuer gebe. Technisch gesehen könnte die Aussage, dass IQOS keinen Rauch abgibt, erlauben, das Rauchverbot in öffentlichen Räumen zu umgehen. In ihren Laborexperimenten haben die Wissenschaftler beobach-tet, dass IQOS Rauch erzeugt und Giftstoffe freigibt, die auch im Rauch einer herkömmlichen Zigaret-te enthalten sind. Diese sind für Tabakpyrolyseverfahren typisch und somit die Hauptquelle für toxi-sche Verbindungen im Tabakrauch. Für die Wissenschaftler sollte das Aerosol deshalb als Tabak-rauch angesehen und als solcher reglementiert werden. Sie fordern andere Forschungsgruppen auf, ihre Daten zu überprüfen.
„Medienmitteilung Download PD_Swiss-Aerosol-Award_2016.pdf143.99 kB
Die Schweizer Lungenstiftung hat am Montag, den 14.11. um 1500 Uhr, in Bern im Haus der Universität, Schlösslistrasse 5, den seit 5 Jahren gesponserten Swiss Aerosol Award für Forschende auf dem Gebiet von Luftverschmutzung durch Feinstaub vergeben.
Der diesjährige Preisträger vom Paul Scherrer Institut in 5232 Villigen/Schweiz hat kürzlich eine besonders brisante Entdeckung auf dem Jungfraujoch gemacht, welche es sogar auf die Titelseite der renommierten Wissenschaftszeitung „Science“ geschafft hat. Sie hat direkten Einfluss auf die Berechnung der zukünftigen Klimaerwärmung auf unserer Erde.
Umso mehr sollte sie auch in der Schweiz weiter verbreitet und diskutiert werden!
Download: Forschungsergebissse zu Feinstaub242.03 KB09/10/2017, 18:49
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