Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce December 2015
Northwestern Proteomics oers mulple types of experiments from simple protein idencaon
to protein quantaon. They perform both top-down proteomics analyses and tradional
boom-up proteomics, where proteins are digested with an enzyme prior to analysis and intact.
Proteomics, the large-scale study of proteins, is crical to
many research projects taking place at Northwestern
University Feinberg School of Medicine.
Plans are in place to expand this area of study on the Chicago
campus in 2016 to help sciensts use proteins to make
breakthroughs in many elds of study, from cancer and
neurodegenerave research to organ transplantaon and
reproducve sciences.
Northwestern Proteomics, a research center and core, will
add more sta and instruments for translaonal proteomics
research in early 2016.
The core facility oers services ranging from boom-up to
top-down proteomics as wells as protein idencaon and
quancaon.
“Proteomics is similar to genomics in that it can be applied to
many dierent elds,” said Paul Thomas, PhD, associate
director of Northwestern Proteomics.
“Where proteomics gains a handle is that while the genome
of a liver, heart or skin cell are all prey much the same, the
proteins within each act as the primary regulators of both the
fate and funcon of cells. We hope to bring our experse to
Feinberg to help advance research at the medical school and
the Lurie Cancer Center.”
(connued on page 2)
Proteomics to Expand on Chicago Campus
1
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
Proteomics Center of Excellence members Paul Thomas, Ioanna Ntai, Neil Kelleher
and Phil Compton.
Proteomics to Expand on Chicago Campus
(connued from cover page)
Neil Kelleher, PhD, faculty director of Northwestern
Proteomics and a professor of Medicine and Biochemistry and
Molecular Genecs, was a graduate student under the guid-
ance of Fred McLaerty, PhD, professor emeritus at Cornell
University, who developed the eld of top-down proteomics.
Top-down proteomics allows sciensts to access the complete
protein sequence and gives them the ability to locate and
characterize post-translaonal modicaons.
Before this technique was available, sciensts needed to break
down proteins into small parts and analyze them with mass
spectrometry before piecing the informaon together to learn
the protein’s funcon.
At Northwestern, Kelleher has established one of the leading
groups in the world studying intact proteins through top-down
proteomics. Successes in proteomics research at Northwestern
has led to a recently awarded $5.6 million grant from the
Naonal Instute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), to
house the Naonal Resource for Translaonal and
Developmental Proteomics.
This naonal resource will establish a hub for biomedical
projects taking place across the naon and will include a formal
program where invesgators from other instuons can visit
Northwestern to learn top-down proteomics.
Kelleher expects about two-dozen visitors per year to learn
top-down techniques so they can to apply them to their own
laboratories.
“Now with federal support, we can really try and accelerate the
rate top-down proteomics becomes accepted and widespread,”
said Kelleher, also a member of the Robert H. Lurie Compre-
hensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University. “The next
step is to train others and connue to develop the technology –
we want to be on the forefront.”
The NIGMS grant includes eight core biomedical projects,
four of which involve Feinberg principal invesgators:
Michael Abecassis, MD, chief of Organ Transplantaon in the
Department of
Surgery, Shuo Ma, MD, PhD, associate professor
of Medicine in the Division of Hematology/Oncology, John
Wilkins, MD
, assistant professor of Medicine in the Division of
Cardiology and of Prevenve Medicine, and Teresa Woodru,
PhD, chief of Reproducve Science and Medicine in the
Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology.
Their invesgaons range from trying to idenfy proteins that
could be early markers of rejecon before a transplant organ
fails, to markers that could predict cardiovascular incidents or
stages of cardiovascular degeneraon.
Thomas and Kelleher have also been working with Hande
Ozdinler, PhD, assistant professor of Neurology, to apply top-
down proteomics techniques to isolate populaons of healthy
and diseased upper motor neurons at dierent ALS disease
stages and to determine the protein content within neuron
populaons.
“With an ALS Associaon grant, we were able to look at
proteins involved in the progression and formaon of ALS in
mouse models,” Thomas said. “This informaon could be used
to idenfy early detecon makers for diseases in which upper
motor neurons are aected.”
“Previously, it was impossible to invesgate the protein
content of disnct neuron populaons because proteomic
approaches were not sensive enough to detect low levels of
proteins,” Ozdinler said. “Thanks to the experse brought by
Northwestern Proteomics ,we can study very detailed aspects
of protein biology in diseased neurons.”
Northwestern’s Proteomics is supported by the University,
Oce for Research, Feinberg School of Medicine and Chemistry
of Life Processes Instute.
If you are interested in subming samples to the Northwestern
Proteomics core facility, nd out more here. If you would like to
learn more about deeper collaboraon with the center or the
new naonal resource, contact Northwestern Proteomics here.
2
CONTENTS
Faculty prole: Grant Barish 3
Research day 2016 4
Sta prole: Joe Boyle 5
Student prole: Amanda Cook 6
In the news and NUCATS corner 7
Sponsored research 8-9
Galter Library connecon 10
High-impact research 11
Events and NIH news 12
3
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
Molecular Mechanisms that Control Metabolism
Grant Barish, MD, assistant professor of Medicine, Division of Endocrinology
Q&A
What are your research interests?
Broadly speaking, I am interested in the molecular mechanisms that control metabolism
under normal condions and in the seng of disease. I am parcularly focused on the
regulaon of gene expression, by further understanding proteins that directly bind to
DNA and control transcripon. To this end, I like to combine approaches that range from
physiological analysis in mouse models to cung-edge methods in genomics.
What is the ulmate goal of your research?
I hope to advance the understanding of obesity-related disorders including type 2
diabetes mellitus and atherosclerosis. Ideally, some of our basic invesgaons may
idenfy new therapeuc targets for these condions.
How did you become interested in this area of research?
My interest in transcriponal regulaon dates back to my research as a medical student,
when I studied signal transducon. As I progressed through my clinical training and
decided to become an endocrinologist, I pursued work in nuclear hormone receptor
biology as a postdoctoral fellow. This superfamily of transcripon factors is key in the
transcriponal regulaon of endocrine and metabolic pathways. I connue some work
on nuclear hormone receptors but have also branched out into work on other
transcriponal regulators of metabolism.
Who makes up your research team?
I have a small lab that consists of three graduate students and a technician. Each student
has an independent project and focuses on a dierent cell or ssue type. Madhavi
Senagolage is a fourth-year student in the Driskill Graduate Program in Life Sciences
(DPG) studying adipose ssue and macrophages, Meredith Sommars is a third-year
DGP student studying the liver and Krithika Ramachandran is a third year DGP student
studying muscle. Amanda Allred, our technician, is a recent college graduate and helps
to support each of the graduate students in their various projects.
Which honors are you most proud of and why?
As a medical student, I applied and was selected as a Howard Hughes Medical Instute
– NIH Research Scholar. This experience was the most important one of my career, as
I developed a passion for basic biomedical research during that me, and this shaped
my course through medicine thereaer. At that me, I was exposed to some of the
most preeminent sciensts of the late tweneth century in small group meengs and
lectures, which was incredibly inspiring. I also interacted with a number of like-minded
contemporaries from all over the country, many of whom are now faculty members at
various academic instuons.
What do you enjoy about teaching and mentoring young sciensts in the lab?
I enjoy giving my trainees the tools that they need not only to carry out original
experiments but also to take the intellectual reigns for their project. It is incredibly
grafying to see young people in their twenes making signicant discoveries. I have
been in research long enough to know how tough it can be to make advances. There
is no cookbook or roadmap for this undertaking, unfortunately. So I try to stay posive
and keep trainees feeling posive, because what they are doing is hard. As my trainees
connue along, I am learning a lot from them in terms of both techniques and subject
maer, which is also quite grafying to me.
Grant Barish, MD, assistant professor
of Medicine in the Division of
Endocrinology, leads a lab devoted to
idenfying new gene pathways that
regulate metabolism. His basic science
research could have applicaons for
treang comorbidies of obesity,
including type 2 diabetes and
cardiovascular disease.
In previous work, his group has helped
to reveal the genomic architecture
for transcriponal regulaon – the
fundamental control mechanism for
inammaon – in macrophages and
discovered a powerful role for the
BCL6 repressor in the prevenon of
atherosclerosis.
Dr. Barish earned his medical degree
at the University of Michigan and
completed residency and a fellowship
at the University of California,
San Francisco Medical Center. He
completed a post-doctoral fellowship
at the Salk Instute for Biological
Studies before joining Feinberg in
2012.
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
4
Save the Date
Research Day is a campus-wide event to promote faculty and trainee development through the sharing of excing research and
conversaon with colleagues. The day features a number of speakers, awards and the largest poster session at Northwestern.
The 2016 event will take place on Northwestern University’s Chicago campus on Thursday, April 7, 2016.
2016 Research Day Keynote Speaker
Eric Olson, PhD, is professor and chair of the Department of Molecular Biology and Director of
the Hamon Center for Regenerave Science and Medicine at UT Southwestern Medical Center.
He also holds the Robert A. Welch Disnguished Chair and the Annie and Willie Nelson
Professorship in Stem Cell Research.
Olson and his trainees discovered many of the key transcripon factors and mechanisms
responsible for development of the heart and other muscles. His laboratory also unveiled the
signaling pathways responsible for pathological cardiac hypertrophy and heart failure.
Olson’s discoveries at the interface of developmental biology and medicine have illuminated
the fundamental principles of organ formaon and have provided new concepts in the quest
for cardiovascular therapeucs.
Olson is a member of the U.S. Naonal Academy of Sciences, the Instute of Medicine and the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
His work has been recognized by numerous awards, including the Basic Research Prize and Research Achievement Award from
the American Heart Associaon, the Pasarow Medical Research Award, the Pollin Prize, the Passano Award, and the March
of Dimes Prize in Developmental Biology. In 2009, the French Academy of Science awarded Dr. Olson the Fondaon Lefou-
lon-Delalande Grand Prize for Science.
Olson has co-founded mulple biotechnology companies to design new therapies for heart muscle disease based on his research.
In his spare me, he plays guitar and harmonica with The Transacvators, a rock band inspired by the Texas troubadour Willie
Nelson, who created the professorship that supports his research.
Read more about Olson’s research.
12th Annual
Lewis Landsberg Research Day
Thursday, April 7, 2016
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
Helping Feinberg Scientists Focus on Research
Joe Boyle, Program Assistant, Oce for Research
Where are you originally
from?
I grew up in a southwest
suburb of Chicago, Alsip,
Illinois. I moved to the
“city” in 2013.
What is your educaonal
background?
I have my bachelor’s
degree from Lewis
University in human
resources. I am currently
pursuing a master’s degree
from Northwestern School
of Professional Studies in
informaon systems, with
a specializaon in project management. I ancipate graduang
spring 2017.
Please tell us about your professional background.
In college I worked as a general manager of a Jimmy John’s.
When I graduated from college I started working at Northwest-
ern School of Law as the Payroll Coordinator. In February of
2015 I started in the Feinberg Research Oce. I love it here.
Why did you choose to work at Northwestern?
Northwestern has great benets and innovave research. The
presge alone is reason enough to work here. We have a won-
derful and inclusive culture.
My supervisor, Eric Boberg, connually makes it a great place
to work. All of these reasons, and many more, keep me coming
back!
How do you help sciensts and/ or research students at the
medical school?
I support Eric Boberg in the Feinberg Research Oce. Eric is in
charge of non-public space assignments. He helps to shape the
big picture and I help him with day-to-day operaons.
Along with many other people, I help Eric “keep the trains
running.” I am also very involved in the planning of Research
Day. Research Day is a campus-wide, annual event to promote
faculty and trainee development through the sharing of excit-
ing research.
What is your favorite part of the job?
I like that I get to meet new people every day and am
constantly walking around campus from one building to
another learning about dierent departments in the medical
school.
What excing projects are you working on?
I just nished assisng with preparing Dr. Ma Lesniak’s lab for
his arrival to Northwestern. My next big project will be working
on Research Day 2016. I am looking forward to learning more
about what research people are focusing on this year.
What do you like to do in your spare me?
Currently, graduate school is consuming a lot of my free me. In
the free me I do have, I enjoy traveling, eang out and going to
concerts.
Connect with Joe on LinkedIn
5
The Future of Medicine is Here
Click to watch a video that showcases what it is like to be a student at
Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.
A new video from the Oce of Communicaons shows how
Feinberg is redening the tradional approach to medicine
and research to train students to be leaders in their eld.
“You get to see how dierent populaons, dierent
ethnicies, dierent genders think about medicine and
what their cultures and backgrounds bring to the table,”
Alex Jones, M4 student said.
From curriculum and student acvies to research and
paent interacon, Feinberg is preparing students to help
take on the challenges of 21st century medicine.
Click the play box to watch the full video.
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
Amanda Cook, a fourth-
year PhD student in
Northwestern University’s
Clinical Psychology
Program, studies
“SuperAgers,” elderly
adults with extraordinary
memory abilies for
their age, in order to
understand the factors
that drive successful
cognive aging in
advanced age.
Cook earned a bachelor’s
degree in neuroscience
from Middlebury College
in Vermont and a Master of Science in medical sciences
from Boston University. Through her masters program and
research work she found the eld of neuropsychology and a
perfect working environment in the Northwestern’s Cognive
Neurology and Alzheimer’s Disease Center (CNADC).
Q&A
Where is your hometown?
New York City.
What are your research interests?
As the aging populaon connues to increase in the U.S.,
age-related cognive decline and demena caused by
neurodegenerave brain disease have come to the forefront of
public health. Both create a nancial burden and aect quality
of life for aicted individuals and those who care for them.
My main research interest is the prevenon of cognive decline
and demena through the study of individuals who appear
to retain cognive power as they age without the notable
reducons that impact the majority of the populaon.
What excing projects are you working on?
Under the guidance of Emily Rogalski, PhD, research associate
professor at the CNADC and Sandra Weintraub, PhD, professor
of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, I am involved in the
fascinang study of cognive “SuperAgers,” individuals over
the age of 80 whose retenve memory is indisnguishable
from individuals at least 20 to 30 years their junior. The goal
of the overall project is to invesgate what contributes to such
successful cognive aging and thus provide possible targets for
therapeuc intervenons for individuals experiencing
age-related or neurodegenerave cognive decline. Early
excing results from my recent work demonstrate greater
corcal integrity and reduced rates of corcal atrophy in
cognive SuperAgers compared to their cognively-average-
for-age peers. This is highly unusual as most studies of
cognively normal individuals show a high level of age-related
corcal atrophy on MRI scans.
A second excing project has brought together Rogalski and
Weintraub with Hans Breiter, MD, professor of Psychiatry and
Behavioral Sciences and James Reilly, PhD, associate professor
of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences to invesgate working
memory in SuperAgers using a mulmodal approach that spans
the domains of clinical and experimental neuropsychology,
mathemacal modeling of behavior and structural
neuroimaging. Working memory is a very short-term memory
store that is acve when new informaon is received, before
it gets stored in longer-term memory. This muldisciplinary
work will lay the foundaon for understanding if a high level
of working memory contributes to the extraordinary retenve
memory of cognive SuperAgers and if it is related to their
preserved corcal brain integrity.
What aracted you to the PhD program?
I was drawn to Feinberg’s Clinical Psychology Doctoral
Program’s neuropsychology and behavioral neuroscience
emphasis as it takes a muldisciplinary approach to the study
of neurodegenerave disease through coursework at Feinberg,
research at the CNADC and clinical experience at Northwestern
Memorial Hospital.
How would you describe the faculty at Feinberg?
The Feinberg faculty are extremely engaged in teaching
and consistently make me for students. They have been
extraordinarily willing to collaborate and co-mentor students
who are then able take advantage of a comprehensive
approach to the research of human disease.
What do you do in your free me?
I love running and belong to a local running club. At the end of
the day it is nice to take a break from work, enjoy the outdoors
with friends and let go of graduate school stress.
What are your plans for aer graduaon?
Aer graduaon and a post-doctoral fellowship, I would like
to work as a clinical neuropsychologist at an academic medical
center. The idea of connuing to work as a both a clinician and
researcher would be ideal.
Connect with Amanda on LinkedIn
6
Therapeutic Interventions for Cognitive Decline
Amanda Cook, Clinical Psychology PhD Program
7
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
Research in the News
The New York Times Nov. 3
For Stans, Cholesterol Care May Be Just the Start
Philip Greenland is quoted.
U.S. News & World Report Nov. 3
Managing Cancer as a Chronic Condion
William Gradishar is quoted.
U.S. News & World Report Nov. 5
Don’t Assume Siblings Will Have Food Allergies, Too
Ruchi Gupta is quoted.
The New York Times Nov. 9
Lower cholesterol with diet instead of drugs
Philip Greenland is quoted.
U.S. News & World Report Nov. 9
Just one energy drink sends young adults’ stress hormone
levels soaring
Linda Van Horn is quoted.
Reuters Nov.9
Novo Nordisk diabetes drug fails to help heart failure: study
Clyde Yancy is quoted.
Hungton Post Nov. 9
Does the Nose Know?
Wen Li, Isabel Moallem, Ken Paller and Jay A. Goried’s
research featured.
Associated Press Nov. 10
Study: Even the normal-weight should watch that apple shape
Lisa Ne was quoted.
NBC News Today (Naonal) Nov. 10
Lowering blood pressure to 120 really does save lives
Donald Lloyd-Jones is quoted.
U.S. News & World Report Nov. 20
New Clues to Easing Side Eects From Parkinson’s Drug
James Surmeier’s research is featured.
Crain’s Chicago Business Nov. 24
A doctor’s breakthrough on a rare form of muscular dystrophy
Elizabeth McNally’s research is featured.
More media coverage available online.
NUCATS Corner
i2b2 Includes Laboratory
and Medication Data
The NUCATS Instute has a tradion of developing high-
quality, web-based soware to support biomedical
researchers.
NUCATS has enhanced the capabilies of its i2b2
(Informacs for Integrang Biology & the Bedside) self-
service tool to keep up with the evolving needs of clinical
and translaonal research.
i2b2 allows researchers, students and sta to develop
and run simple queries against a subset of data in the
Northwestern Medicine Enterprise Data Warehouse
(NMEDW).
It gives users the ability to quickly determine the feasibility
of conducng a study and is an important tool to leverage
when wring a grant.
In addion to providing counts of Northwestern Medicine
paents with dierent diseases and procedures, the tool
now allows you to determine how many paents have
received a medicaon and/or laboratory result.
With this new feature, it is now possible to search for
all paents who have had a type of lab result at once by
navigang the categorized elds within the list of terms.
A full lisng of the soware tools NUCATS oers to help in
the planning, development, and conduct of research can be
found
here. To learn more about i2b2, click here.
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
PI: Sanjay Mehrotra, PhD,
Director, Instute for Public
Health and Medicine
Sponsor: Naonal Instute of Biomedi-
cal Imaging and Bioengineering
Title:“Unassisted Blood Pressure Mon-
itoring Using Arterial Tonometry and
Photoplethysmography”
Unmanaged hypertension is a major problem, and its
management based on occasional measurement is known
to be subopmal. The ability to measure blood pressure
using non-invasive techniques in an ambulatory seng has
many signicant benets. This research will develop a large
device based o of two-dimensional array pressure sensors,
together with robust signal processing algorithms and feedback
controlled to measure blood pressure at the wrist. The device
will be tested based on the European Society of Hypertension
Internaonal Protocol.
Mehrotra and his team propose that the pressure sensor array
together with a photoplethysmogram sensor will be embedded
in a band and will provide signals through a mulplexed
circuit design. Signal condioning techniques will be used to
get the large amount of data in a form that can be eciently
processed on a microcontroller. The proposed two-dimensional
array of pressure sensors will be built using exible plasc and
micro-fabricaon techniques. The increased size of the sensor
array will ensure proper contact and pressure applicaon
with arteries in the wrist for tonometric measurement of
blood pressure. The signals generated from the sensor array
will be processed through advanced signal processing and
opmizaon techniques to handle the huge amount of data
and to migate noise.
The PPG signals will be used at the wrist to improve the
eciency and accuracy of the system. The sensor array
system will be embodied in the form of a band, which will
be integrated in a wearable device such as smartwatch. The
capabilies of the smartwatch will be used for data processing
and analycs.
Sponsored Research
8
PI: Marc Slutzky, MD/PhD
Associate Professor of Neurology
and Physiology
Sponsor: Naonal Instute of
Neurological Disorders and Stroke
Title: “Designing brain machine inter-
faces to drive plascity and enhance
recovery aer brain injury”
More than nine million Americans are disabled by brain injury
and half of them will have persistent impairment of hand
funcon despite receiving convenonal treatment. Thus, new
therapies are needed to restore hand funcon to brain-injured
paents. Funconal improvement aer brain injury correlates
with an enlarged area of cerebral cortex corresponding to the
improved movement, but it is unclear if the enlarged map
causes improved funcon.
Slutzky’s team and others have shown that brain machine
interfaces (BMIs), which enable subjects to use their brain
signals to directly control external devices, can induce plasc
changes in the brain’s acvity. Their collaborators have shown
that noninvasive BMIs using brain signals recorded from the
scalp can improve walking in stroke survivors. Slutzky and his
team propose to develop a novel therapeuc approach to
improving movement aer brain injury by using a BMI to direct
the brain’s inherent mechanisms of reorganizaon to restore
connecons to the damaged areas of the brain.
This project will test the hypothesis that opmally driving
plascity and corcal motor map changes is crically
dependent on simultaneously acvang motor intent and
hapc feedback. It will also test the eects of motor map
changes on hand motor funcon. In parcular, it will invesgate
the types and features of neural signals used to control the
BMI, the temporal precision with which somatosensory feed-
back must be synchronized with motor intent and the spaal
precision of movement intent used to control the BMI.
Slutzky proposes that high-frequency signals will enable much
greater spaotemporal precision than the low frequencies used
in noninvasive BMIs for rehabilitaon to date. His team has
shown previously that such signals, using electrodes implanted
on the surface of the brain or the dura mater, can be used to
“decode” hand movements and grip force with high accuracy.
In the long term, such electrodes could be implanted tempo-
rarily with relavely small risk to the paent. In the short term
they wish to test this hypothesis in brain-injured subjects with-
out incurring signicant risk. This project will use scalp-based
BMIs in subjects with traumac brain injuries who have under-
gone hemicraniectomies as part of their clinical care. Slutzky’s
team has found that high frequency signals from the scalp in
these paents comes close to that of signals recorded outside
the dura. This project will rst test the extent to which BMI
training using high-frequency signals vs. low-frequency signals
drives motor map enlargement and improves hand funcon.
9
Stem Cell-Derived Blood Products for Therapeuc
Use: Technology Improvement
More informaon
Sponsor: United States Department of Health and Human
Services, Naonal Instutes of Health, Naonal Heart, Lung,
and Blood Instute
Submission deadline: Feb. 20
Upper Amount: $1.5 million
Synopsis: The primary objecve of this funding opportunity
announcement is to support the development of improved
techniques and tools to enhance the producon of
clinically-relevant, funconal stem cell-derived red blood
cells or platelets in a more ecient and cost-eecve man
-
ner.
Pediatric Diagnosc Biomarkers for Acve
Pulmonary TB Disease
More informaon
Sponsor: Naonal Instutes of Health and
Naonal Instute of Allergy and Infecous Diseases
Submission deadline: March 11
Upper Amount: $2 million
Synopsis: The purpose of this funding opportunity
announcement (FOA) is to support projects to idenfy and/
or validate biomarkers or biomarker combinaons leading to
improved diagnosis of acve pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) in
children, including HIV infected children.
For the purposes of the FOA, a biomarker is a biological
molecule found in blood, other body uids, or ssues that is
a sign of a normal or abnormal process, or of a condion or
disease. A biomarker may be used to diagnose, evaluate risk,
or evaluate treatment response for a disease or condion.
Development of biomarkers entails a number of phases, from
idencaon of promising molecular targets to validaon
studies in associaon with clinical diagnosis.
A biomarker validaon study is designed to validate candi-
date biomarker(s) for diagnosc purposes for their specicity,
sensivity, robustness and ulity in cohorts and biomarker
validaon studies are an integral part of the biomarker and
diagnoscs development pathway.
View more funding opportunies
Funding
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
First Place
Scientific Images Contest
The image centers on a mouse ovarian follicle (in purple).
A scienc image of a mouse ovarian follicle won rst place in
the 2015 Northwestern Scienc Images Contest.
The image was submied by Monica Laronda, a
postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Obstetrics and Gyne-
cology at Feinberg and Adam Jakus, a postdoctoral fellow in the
Department of Materials Science and Engineering at the Mc-
Cormick School of Engineering. They used a scanning electron
microscope to capture the image and colored it in Photoshop.
Laronda and Jakus have created a new paper-like biomaterial
made of ovarian proteins (in green). It is designed to support
removed follicles as they develop into mature eggs. This image
shows a healthy follicle ourishing in the new environment.
Someday supporve biomaterials like these could help cancer
survivors grow families of their own.
Welcome New Faculty
Yuan Luo, PhD, joins as assistant
professor of Prevenve Medicine in
the division of Health and Biomedical
Informacs and assistant professor
at the McCormick School of
Engineering.
Luo earned his PhD in Electrical
Engineering and Computer Science
from the Massachuses Instute of
Technology. His research interests
include machine learning, natural language processing, me
series analysis, integrave genomic analysis and big data
analycs, with a focus on medical and clinical applicaons.
As a researcher, you spend me and energy compleng
important projects, but have you considered all the possible
ways to share those ndings with the scienc community?
There are many tools available for sharing, publishing and
archiving your work depending on the type of research
output. Be sure to consider all your opons when it comes to
disseminang your work, and be aware of the strengths and
limitaons of each tool before you dive in.
White Papers, Technical Reports, or early research results
What are your opons for those research ndings you want
to share, but that are sll too early for the formal publishing
process, or for when your arcle doesn’t t the formal
publishing mold? Keep in mind that these tools support many
research outputs including, but also beyond, the classic journal
arcle.
• DigitalHub is Northwestern Medicine’s instuonal
repository, created to increase the discovery and
recognion of our research and scholarship. With an
easy-to-use interface and a variety of sharing opons,
DigitalHub is an excellent place to upload all types of
documents. Also, it is indexed by Google, so your results
will be highly visible online.
• The Winnower operates on the principle that the scholarly
process should “winnow out” the truth through open
discussion and debate. The Winnower combines an open
access online publishing plaorm with an open post-
publicaon peer-review process. They publish a wide
variety of document types beyond the journal arcle,
including grants, leers, and blogs.
• bioRxiv is a free online archive for unpublished preprints
operated by the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. bioRxiv
allows researchers to make their ndings immediately
available and open for comments by the scienc
community. Other opons for pre-prints include the SSRN
and arXiv repositories.
Conference Papers, Posters and Presentaons
You’ve spent hours preparing for a conference presentaon,
or pung the nishing touches on an informave poster. Take
some me to consider how to share those outputs with an
audience beyond those aending the conference.
• Speaker Deck, supported by GitHub (known for its
collaborave plaorm for computer code management),
makes it easy for presenters to upload a PDF le of their
slides, turning those slides into a seamless presentaon.
Another opon for sharing slides is SlideShare.
•
Vimeo is a video sharing website where you could upload
a conference presentaon (if allowed by the conference)
or related videos. The basic membership is free and videos
are generally free of distracng adversements. Another
opon for videos is YouTube.
•
F1000 Posters (now merged with F1000 Research) is an
open access poster repository for the life sciences and
medicine, making your conference poster immediately
available and visible online. Approved posters or slides
are given a Digital Object Idener (DOI), and are indexed
by Sparrho and the Neuroscience Informaon Framework
(NIF).
• ScienceOpen Posters is supported by the open access
publisher ScienceOpen. Submied posters receive a
Digital Object Idener (DOI), and are easy for viewers
to download, share, comment or bookmark from
ScienceOpen Posters journal.
Datasets
Big data is a trending topic that seems to aect almost
everyone in research. Data management plans are an
important part of research. Beyond subming your data to an
appropriate repository, consider publishing it in data-specic
journals.
Dryad
is a curated repository of data les associated with any
published arcle in the sciences or medicine, and it ensures
researchers get credit for their data by promong data citaon
and tracking of data-reuse.
Zenodo
is an open access repository funded by CERN
and OpenAire as a home for research results (data and
publicaons) that are not part of exisng instuonal or
subject-based repositories.
Giga Science is an online, open-access, open-data journal that
publishes big-data studies in the life and biomedical sciences,
and includes an extensive database that hosts all associated
data.
Scienc Data
by Nature Publishing Group, is an open access,
peer-reviewed publicaon for descripons of scienc
datasets. Publicaons are indexed by PubMed and Google
Scholar.
Need more help? Contact your
liaison librarian.
Galter Library Connection
Sharing, Publishing and Archiving Your Work
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
10
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
October 2015
Berger ER, Greenberg CC, Bilimoria KY. Challenges in Reducing
Surgical “Never Events”. JAMA. 2015 Oct 6;314(13):1386-1387.
Bilimoria KY. Facilitang Quality Improvement: Pushing the
Pendulum Back Toward Process Measures. JAMA. 2015 Oct
6;314(13):1333-1334.
Fleshman J, Branda M, Sargent DJ, Boller AM, et al. Eect
of Laparoscopic-Assisted Resecon vs Open Resecon of
Stage II or III Rectal Cancer on Pathologic Outcomes: The
ACOSOG Z6051 Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA. 2015 Oct
6;314(13):1346-1355.
Gracies JM, Brashear A, Jech R, McAllister P, Banach M,
Valkovic P, Walker H, Marciniak C, Deltombe T, Skoromets
A, Khatkova S, Edgley S, Gul F, Catus F, De Fer BB, Vilain C,
Picaut P, Int Abobotulinumtoxin AAU. Safety and ecacy of
abobotulinumtoxinA for hemiparesis in adults with upper
limb spascity aer stroke or traumac brain injury: a double-
blind randomised controlled trial. Lancet Neurology. 2015
Oct;14(10):992-1001.
Grijalva CG, Zhu Y, Williams DJ, Self WH, Ampofo K, Pavia AT,
Stockmann CR, McCullers J, Arnold SR, Wunderink RG, et
al. Associaon Between Hospitalizaon With Community-
Acquired Laboratory-Conrmed Inuenza Pneumonia and
Prior Receipt of Inuenza Vaccinaon. JAMA. 2015 Oct
13;314(14):1488-1497.
Hope TJ. VIROLOGY. Visualizing trans-infecon. Science. 2015
Oct 30;350(6260):511-512.
Humaster NJ, Sollars PJ, Richards AL, Pickard GE, Smith
GA. Dynamic ubiquinaon drives herpesvirus
neuroinvasion. Proceedings of the Naonal Academy
of Sciences of the United States of America. 2015
Oct;112(41):12818-12823.
Jovasevic V, Naghavi MH, Walsh D. Microtubule plus end-
associated CLIP-170 iniates HSV-1 retrograde transport
in primary human cells. Journal of Cell Biology. 2015 Oct
26;211(2):323-337.
Lebwohl M, Strober B, Menter A, Gordon K, et al. Phase 3
Studies Comparing Brodalumab with Ustekinumab in Psoriasis.
New England Journal of Medicine. 2015 Oct;373(14):1318-
1328.
Li Y, Zhou QL, Sun W, Chandrasekharan P, Cheng HS, Ying Z,
Lakshmanan M, Raju A, Tenen DG, Cheng SY, Chuang KH,
Li J, Prabhakar S, Li M, Tergaonkar V. Non-canonical NF-
kappaB signalling and ETS1/2 cooperavely drive C250T
mutant TERT promoter acvaon. Nature Cell Biology. 2015
Oct;17(10):1327-1338.
Li Z, Hung C, Paterson RG, Michel F, Fuentes S, Place R, Lin Y,
Hogan RJ, Lamb RA, He B. Type II integral membrane protein,
TM of J paramyxovirus promotes cell-to-cell fusion. Proceedings
of the Naonal Academy of Sciences of the United States of
America. 2015 Oct 6;112(40):12504-12509.
Mo RA, Maraya R, Flate EL, Volmar KE, Loeza SGH, Hoadley
KA, Rashid NU, Williams LA, Eaton SC, Chung AH, Smyla JK,
Anderson JM, Kim HJ, Bentrem DJ, Talamon MS, Iacobuzio-
Donahue CA, Hollingsworth MA, Yeh JJ. Virtual microdissecon
idenes disnct tumor- and stroma-specic subtypes of
pancreac ductal adenocarcinoma. Nature Genecs. 2015
Oct;47(10):1168-1178.
Ortega-Molina A, Boss IW, Canela A, Pan H, Jiang YW, Zhao
CY, Jiang M, Hu DQ, Agirre X, Niesvizky I, Lee JE, Chen HT,
Ennishi D, Sco DW, Mook A, Hother C, Liu SC, Cao XJ, Tam
W, Shaknovich R, Garcia BA, Gascoyne RD, Ge K, Shilafard
A, Elemento O, Nussenzweig A, Melnick AM, Wendel
HG. The histone lysine methyltransferase KMT2D sustains
a gene expression program that represses B cell lymphoma
development. Nature Medicine. 2015 Oct;21(10):1199.
Rock CL, Fla SW, Byers TE, Colditz GA, Demark-Wahnefried
W, Ganz PA, Wolin KY, Elias A, Kronras H, Liu J, Naughton M,
Pakiz B, Parker BA, Sedjo RL, Wya H. Results of the Exercise
and Nutrion to Enhance Recovery and Good Health for
You (ENERGY) Trial: A Behavioral Weight Loss Intervenon
in Overweight or Obese Breast Cancer Survivors. Journal of
Clinical Oncology. 2015 Oct 1;33(28):3169-3176.
Roth GA, Human MD, Moran AE, Feigin V, Mensah GA,
Naghavi M, Murray CJ. Global and Regional Paerns in
Cardiovascular Mortality From 1990 to 2013. Circulaon. 2015
Oct 27;132(17):1667-1678.
Silverberg MJ, Lau B, Achenbach CJ, et al. Cumulave Incidence
of Cancer Among Persons With HIV in North America A Cohort
Study. Annals of Internal Medicine. 2015 Oct;163(7):507.
Wandling MW, Guillamondegui OD. Eliminang the Confusion
Surrounding Concussions in Sports. JAMA. 2015 Oct
6;314(13):1388-1389.
Weber EW, Han F, Tauseef M, Birnbaumer L, Mehta D, Muller
WA. TRPC6 is the endothelial calcium channel that regulates
leukocyte transendothelial migraon during the inammatory
response. Journal of Experimental Medicine. 2015 Oct
19;212(11):1883-1899.
Zhang Y, Rajan R, Seifert HS, Mondragon A, Sontheimer
EJ. DNase H Acvity of Neisseria meningidis Cas9. Molecular
Cell. 2015 Oct 15;60(2):242-255.
High Impact Factor Research
11
12
Feinberg School of Medicine Research Oce Breakthroughs
December 2015
Wednesday, January 6
R3 Data Club: Monica Laronda: Engineering an
Ovarian Prosthesis
Monica Laronda, postdoctoral fellow in the Woodru Lab, will
present her research on “Engineering an Ovarian Prosthesis
Ulizing Natural and 3D Printed Scaolds.”
Time: Noon to 1:00 p.m.
Locaon: Robert H Lurie Medical Research Center
10-123
303 E. Superior
Contact: crs@northwestern.edu
More informaon
Thursday, January 14
BME Seminar Series: Mahnaz Shahidi, PhD
Mahnaz Shahidi, PhD, Professor of Ophthalmology and Profes-
sor of Physics and Bioengineering at the University of Illinois
at Chicago will give a lecture tled: “Imaging of Renal Oxygen
Delivery and Metabolism.”
Time: 4:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.
Locaon: Robert H Lurie Medical Research Center
Baldwin Auditorium
303 E. Superior
Contact: Stephanie Hellenga Waninger
More informaon
Thursday, January 21
Center for Community Health Writing
Manuscript Retreat
This retreat focuses on manuscripts related to community-
engaged research. This includes community, paent and
stakeholder engagement.
Time: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Locaon: Arthur Rublo Building, 11th Floor
Lakeview Conference Room
750 N. Lake Shore Drive
Contact: cch@northwestern.edu
More informaon
More Events
Event organizers are encouraged to submit calendar items on
Plan-It Purple for consideraon. Please contact the Research
Oce with further quesons.
Calendar
Follow Feinberg Online
NIH News
NIH Will No Longer Support Biomedical Research
on Chimpanzees
Cing many recent developments related to using capve
chimpanzees in biomedical research, Francis Collins, NIH
Director, announced on Nov. 18 that eecve immediately,
the NIH will no longer maintain its colony of chimpanzees for
future research.
All NIH-owned chimpanzees that reside outside of the
Federal Sanctuary System operated by Chimp Haven,
Keithville, Louisiana, are now eligible for rerement. This
decision is specic to chimpanzees. Research with other
non-human primates will connue to be valued, supported
and conducted by the NIH. Read more.
Addressing Diversity in the Physician-Scienst Workforce
There is a new NIH-issued a request for informaon with the
goal of gathering community input on quesons related to
how to increase diversity among our naon’s physician-
sciensts.
Some quesons include:
• What are the career trajectories unique to
underrepresented groups among physician sciensts?
• What are potenal barriers to a diverse physician-
scienst workforce?
• And what strategies could successfully enhance the
diversity in this subset of researchers?
Read the request and submit formal comments.
All About Grants Podcast
The latest NIH “All About Grants” podcast focuses on
cercates of condenality (CoCs).
Dr. Ann Hardy, NIH’s human subjects research protecon
ocer, talks about how CoCs can enhance your human
subjects research, as well as protect and benet research
parcipants. She also explains who can apply for CoCs, and
how to do so.
Listen to the podcast.