june 2012 volume 8, issue 3 Advancing Biomedical Science, Education, and Health Care Scientists honored for research unveiling molecular machines The month of May brought the good prestigious honors in science. On the Campylobacter, which together cause chains of amino acids are formed into news that two School of Medicine 29th, Arthur L. Horwich, m.d., was most of the world’s food-borne illness. three-dimensional, functional struc- scientists, each of whom have done named a winner of the Shaw Prize Galán’s group has thoroughly tures. Misfolded proteins have been pathbreaking work on molecular ma- in Life Science and Medicine, along characterized the Salmonella “needle implicated in many diseases, including chines involved in human disease, had with his longtime scientific col- complex,” a syringe-like organelle Alzheimer’s disease and amyotrophic received high honors for their research. laborator Franz-Ulrich Hartl, m.d., through which the bacterium injects lateral sclerosis (als). On May 1 Jorge E. Galán, ph.d., dr.med., of the Max Planck Institute bacterial proteins into host cells during In 1989, Horwich’s lab, in collabo- d.v.m., chair and Lucille P. Markey of Biochemistry in Germany. infection, modulating the function ration with Hartl and his postdoctoral Professor of Microbial Pathogenesis Galán is renowned for his research of those cells for its own advantage. mentor Walter Neupert m.d., ph.d., and professor of cell biology, was elect- on the cell biology, biochemistry, im- In 2004, Galán and colleagues used discovered a specialized protein in yeast ed a member of the National Academy munobiology, and structural biology of cryoelectron microscopy to visualize called Hsp60 that acts as a protein- of Sciences (nas), one of the most the bacterial pathogens Salmonella and the three-dimensional structure of the folding machine. Horwich and col- needle complex. For his wide-ranging leagues went on to elucidate how such research, in 2011 he was awarded the machines work by studying a related Koch Prize, the leading international bacterial protein called GroEL. By 1993, scientific award in microbiology. in a collaboration with the late Yale The nas, an organization of sci- X-ray crystallographer Paul B. Sigler, entists and engineers dedicated to the ph.d., the atomic structure of GroEL— furtherance of science and its use for a “beautiful work of nature,” in Hor- the general welfare, was established in wich’s words—had been deciphered. 1863. The Academy acts as an official The Shaw Prizes carry a monetary adviser to the federal government in award of $1 million (U.S.) and are any matter of science or technology. given by the Hong Kong-based Shaw Also elected to the nas in May Prize Foundation for achievement in was John R. Carlson, ph.d., of the the life sciences, astronomy, and math- Department of Cellular, Molecular, ematics. Established in 2002 by film- and Developmental Biology in Yale’s maker and philanthropist Run Run Faculty of Arts and Sciences, bringing Shaw, the awards are “dedicated to the total number of nas members at furthering societal progress, enhancing Yale to 63. quality of life, and enriching humani- harold shapiro harold Horwich, an nas member since ty’s spiritual civilization.” Horwich and Jorge Galán (left), who has studied the molecular basis of infection by Salmonella and other food- borne pathogens, was elected to the National Academy of Sciences. Arthur Horwich shares the 2003, has devoted his career to un- Hartl will receive the award in Hong Shaw Prize in Life Science and Medicine for his contributions to understanding protein folding. derstanding protein folding—how Kong in September. Student research on heart surgery gets a boost from new endowment In the 1960s, when cardiac surgery W.L. Glenn, m.d., then chief of the heart defects—and he trained numer- was still a young field, Horace C. cardiac surgery section. ous physician- scientists who went on to Stansel Jr., m.d., was already making “As a junior faculty colleague, head surgery departments around the his mark at Yale as a skillful, innova- I learned a great deal from Stan,” country. “Stan personified the com- tive pediatric heart surgeon. A mem- recalls John E. Fenn, m.d., now clini- mitment to life-long learning that is so ber of the School of Medicine faculty cal professor of surgery at the medical necessary to medicine,” says Fenn. until his death in 1994, Stansel built a school. “He was a skilled surgeon To carry on Stansel’s legacy, the reputation as a consummate physi- who could think on his feet. He was Stansel family recently established an cian, researcher, and educator, and a master at knowing how to get out endowment that will provide support was a mentor to generations of medi- of trouble in the operating room, to Yale medical students conducting cal students and residents. and colleagues often called on him research in cardiac surgery. Known Known as “Stan” to friends and for assistance.” as the Horace C. Stansel Jr. Research colleagues, Stansel trained with Stansel also pushed the boundaries Fund, the endowment will provide courtesy of doris stansel Ormand C. Julian, m.d., at Presby- of surgical technique—the Damus- one- and two-year fellowships to Pediatric heart surgeon Horace Stansel, seen terian St. Luke’s Hospital in Chicago Kaye-Stansel procedure is still used by students with financial need, allowing in a 1978 photo with a patient, was a widely and was recruited to Yale by William pediatric surgeons to treat congenital them to pursue research // Gift (page 8) admired physician, researcher, and educator. Non-Profit Org. inside this issue 1 Church St., Suite 300, New Haven, CT 06510-3330 U. S. Postage www.medicineatyale.org 2 Lifelines paid Since her first foray into research on the New Haven, CT brain bases of nicotine addiction, neurosci- Permit No. 526 entist Marina Picciotto has been “hooked.” 3 Primary care—and much more Research in Yale’s Section of General Inter- nal Medicine shapes health care worldwide. 5 Cancer: a new day Results from a clinical trial show the goal of immunotherapy may be within reach. also Advances, pp. 3, 5 Out & About, p. 4 Grants and Contracts, pp. 6–7 @YaleMed f /YaleMed lifelines New section chief to be appointed for Otolaryngology Wendell G. Yarbrough, m.d., will be Marina Picciotto’s research not only sheds light on nico- named chief of tine’s effects on the brain, the Section of but also has implications for Otolaryngology for other important health at the School of issues, such as controlling Medicine and obesity and the development Wendell of effective pain medica- Yale-New Haven Yarbrough tions that do not lead to Hospital (ynhh). drug dependence. He will also be director of the head and neck cancer program at Smilow Cancer Hospital at Yale-New Haven as well as the co-director of the molecular virol- ogy research program at Yale Cancer Center (ycc). Yarbrough, whose appoint- Marina Picciotto michael marsland ment begins August 1, comes to Yale from Vanderbilt University, where he is professor of otolaryn- gology and cancer biology and di- Making sense of addiction rector of the Barry Baker Labora- tory of Head and Neck Oncology. transport of ions across nerve cell them,” Picciotto says. For instance, Neuroscientist is focused He is also the Ingram Professor membranes. “It was very satisfying, in 2011, she and lab member Yann S. of Cancer Research and co-leader on the brain bases of because you could actually say, ‘this Mineur, ph.d., associate research scien- of the thoracic and head and neck goes with this’ [and make] pictures tist, teamed up with colleagues in the tobacco dependence program at the Vanderbilt Ingram that made sense. But I was always Section of Comparative Medicine to Cancer Center. sneakily trying to get back to [the show that a specific type of nicotinic Marina Picciotto, ph.d., says that while Yarbrough’s research con- question], What do those molecules receptor is the crucial trigger for nico- she was growing up in Manhattan, she centrates on the identifi cation of mean for complex behaviors?” tine’s effects on appetite suppression was “one of those scattered people tumor suppressors in head and It’s a question that has driven Pic- and weight-loss in mice. The study, who did well in school but got yelled neck cancers and the understand- ciotto’s research ever since. As a post- published in Science, could lead to new at by the teachers.” In science labs, ing of tumor growth. Recently, doctoral fellow at the Institut Pasteur in strategies to treat obesity. however, “that was never a problem.” his lab has focused on identifying Paris, France, she began studying nico- Picciotto also studies galanin, a At the magnet high school she subtypes of head and neck and tinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs), neuropeptide that works to modu- attended, students completed gradu- salivary cancers and the use of proteins in nerve cells that are acti- late acetylcholine but also heightens ation requirements early, and took on models that the lab has developed vated by the neurotransmitter acetyl- the effects of opiate drugs—many of full-time internships as seniors. Some- to test targeted agents. choline, but also respond to chemicals which are addictive. In 2003, she pub- what by chance, she came across an “I am confi dent that Dr. Yar- like nicotine. She describes this research lished research in Proceedings of the opening in a lab at the Rockefeller Uni- brough’s experience, leadership, the way many describe their first ciga- National Academy of Sciences showing versity, where she worked on studies and goals for head and neck cancer rette: “Once I started, I was hooked.” that in addition to increasing the pain- of feeding behavior in rats that would research and care will strengthen In 1995 she joined the School of fighting effects of opiates, galanin neatly foreshadow her later career.