LJI and Kyowa Kirin launch immunology fellowship program

New Michael Croft Fellowship in Immunology Fund to provide vital support for early career scientists

2023-07-27

(Press-News.org) LA JOLLA, CA—Support for early career researchers is about to get a major boost, thanks to a new fellowship fund established by leaders at La Jolla Institute for Immunology (LJI) and Japan-based global pharmaceutical corporation, Kyowa Kirin, Inc.

The fellowship fund has been named in honor of LJI Professor Michael Croft, Ph.D., who has worked closely with Kyowa Kirin scientists through the years. The new Michael Croft Fellowship in Immunology Fund recognizes Croft’s commitment to training and mentoring the next generation of immunologists. Kyowa Kirin will provide $65,000 to the fund each year, over the next five years.

“LJI and Kyowa Kirin have benefitted from a strong partnership for more than three decades,” says LJI President and CEO Erica Ollmann Saphire, Ph.D. “We are grateful to have Kyowa Kirin’s support in bringing talented researchers to train at the Institute among research leaders such as Michael Croft. These researchers will go on to make important scientific discoveries and advance our understanding of human health.”

The fund’s first fellowship will go to LJI Postdoctoral Researcher Rinkesh Gupta, Ph.D., who leads investigations in the Croft Lab to shed light on diseases such as asthma, psoriasis, and atopic dermatitis.

“This fellowship means a lot to me as a researcher,” says Gupta. “It will not only motivate me but also support my scientific career and further my research in the Croft Lab.”

Gupta studies what he calls the immune system’s “mistakes.” These are cases where the body’s immune cells react to the wrong targets. Allergies and allergic asthma, for example, happen when immune cells overreact to environmental triggers, and autoimmune diseases happen when confused immune cells target the body’s own tissues. “In autoimmune disease, your cells are treated as invaders in your own body,” Gupta explains.

His goal is to identify targets on these wayward immune cells and examine how therapeutics might one day limit the development and severity of autoimmune and allergic diseases.

“Receiving this support from Kyowa Kirin and LJI gives me the encouragement to keep me on the path that I’m on,” says Gupta.

: La Jolla Institute renews longtime collaboration with Kyowa Kirin, Inc.

END

[Attachments] See images for this press release:

LJI and Kyowa Kirin launch immunology fellowship program 2

LJI and Kyowa Kirin launch immunology fellowship program 3

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

Stephen K. Streiffer named director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory

2023-07-27

UT-Battelle, LLC, has appointed Stephen K. Streiffer to be the next director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). He currently serves as interim director at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and will join ORNL in October. “Stephen is a proven leader with diverse experience and a commitment to mission-driven research and development,” said Lou Von Thaer, CEO of Battelle and chair of UT-Battelle, which operates ORNL for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). “Throughout his career, Stephen has leveraged existing strengths to create new opportunities and partnerships that strengthen our nation’s ability to innovate ...

Gene therapy treats chronic pain by dialing down sodium

2023-07-27

Researchers at NYU College of Dentistry’s Pain Research Center have developed a gene therapy that treats chronic pain by indirectly regulating a specific sodium ion channel, according to a new study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The innovative therapy, tested in cells and animals, is made possible by the discovery of the precise region where a regulatory protein binds to the NaV1.7 sodium ion channel to control its activity. “Our study represents a major step forward in understanding the underlying biology of the NaV1.7 sodium ion channel, which can be harnessed to provide relief from chronic pain,” said Rajesh ...

Bees and wasps independently invent the same architectural tricks

2023-07-27

At first glance, the hexagonal cells build by honey bees and social wasps may seem similar, but they are significantly different. Honey bees build using wax, whereas wasps use paper. Honey bees build their double-sided combs vertically, whereas wasps build single-sided comb horizontally (i.e., the opening of each cell faces downward). Indeed, the hexagonal cells built by these two groups have independent evolutionary origins. Just like sharks and whales have similar body plans due to their watery environment, bees and wasps build hexagonal cells because the shape maximizes strength and storage area, while minimizing building materials. But what happens when perfectly ...

Study finds strong support for easing Medicaid enrollment procedures

2023-07-27

During the COVID-19 pandemic, governments changed rules and procedures related to Medicaid enrollment. These changes decreased many of the burdens eligible people face when signing up for programs and contributed to a 30 percent increase in Medicaid enrollment. However, the end of public health emergency declarations brings an end to these pandemic policies, which many fear could lead to eligible people losing public health insurance simply because they are unable to fulfill administrative requirements such as accurately filling out and submitting forms, renewing their enrollment ...

MIND diet study shows 'short-term' impact on cognition

2023-07-27

New research shows the importance of long-term commitment to the MIND diet for reaping the greatest benefit to brain health. “The benefits within the new study’s three-year clinical trial weren’t as impressive as we’ve seen with the MIND diet observational studies in the past, but there were improvements in cognition in the short-term, consistent with the longer-term observational data,” said lead study author Lisa Barnes, PhD, associate director of the Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center at RUSH. Results from the study, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, showed that within a three-year period, there was no significant ...

Race/ethnicity isn't associated with unplanned hospitalizations after breast reconstruction

2023-07-27

July 27, 2023 – Race/ethnicity is not an independent predictor of hospital readmission in patients undergoing breast reconstruction surgery, reports a study in the August issue of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery®, the official medical journal of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons (ASPS). The journal is published in the Lippincott portfolio by Wolters Kluwer. Among patients who have unplanned hospitalizations after breast reconstruction, costs are substantially higher for Black or Hispanic patients, according to the new research by ASPS ...

Nematode resurrected from Siberian permafrost laid dormant for 46,000 years

2023-07-27

A soil nematode reanimated from Siberian permafrost had laid dormant for approximately 46,000 years, according to a study publishing July 27, 2023 in the open access journal PLOS Genetics by Anastasia Shatilovich at the Institute of Physicochemical and Biological Problems in Soil Science RAS in Russia, Vamshidhar Gade at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Germany, and colleagues. Some animals, such as tardigrades, rotifers, and nematodes, can survive harsh conditions by entering a dormant state known as “cryptobiosis”. Previously, nematode individuals were reanimated from samples collected from a fossilized burrow in silt deposits ...

New insights into the origin of the Indo-European languages

2023-07-27

For over two hundred years, the origin of the Indo-European languages has been disputed. Two main theories have recently dominated this debate: the ‘Steppe’ hypothesis, which proposes an origin in the Pontic-Caspian Steppe around 6000 years ago, and the ‘Anatolian’ or ‘farming’ hypothesis, suggesting an older origin tied to early agriculture around 9000 years ago. Previous phylogenetic analyses of Indo-European languages have come to conflicting conclusions about the age of the family, due to the combined effects of inaccuracies and inconsistencies in the datasets they used and limitations in the way that phylogenetic methods analyzed ...

Genome analysis of 46,000-year-old roundworm from Siberian permafrost reveals novel species

2023-07-27

Some organisms, such as tardigrades, rotifers, and nematodes, can survive harsh conditions by entering a dormant state known as “cryptobiosis.” In 2018, researchers from the Institute of Physicochemical and Biological Problems in Soil Science RAS in Russia found two roundworms (nematode) species in the Siberian Permafrost. Radiocarbon dating indicated that the nematode individuals have remained in cryptobiosis since the late Pleistocene, about 46,000 years ago. Researchers from the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG) in ...

Tau-regulating protein identified as a promising target for developing Alzheimer’s disease treatment

2023-07-27

PHILADELPHIA – A gene encoding a protein linked to tau production—tripartite motif protein 11 (TRIM11)—was found to suppress deterioration in small animal models of neurodegenerative diseases similar to Alzheimer’s disease (AD), while improving cognitive and motor abilities, according to new research from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. Additionally, TRIM11 was identified as playing a key role in removing the protein tangles that cause neurodegenerative diseases, like AD. The findings are published today in Science. ...

Wiley advances Knowitall Solutions with new trendfinder application for user-friendly chemometric analysis and additional enhancements to analytical workflows

LJI and Kyowa Kirin launch immunology fellowship program

ELSE PRESS RELEASES FROM THIS DATE:

LAST 30 PRESS RELEASES: