SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY NEWS ❙ WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 17, 2008
From cell to society – health sciences
FACULTY research blossoms at Blusson Hall
OF HEALTH
SCIENCES
www.fhs.sfu.ca
BY JULIE OVENELL-CARTER
New Access to
Government Stats
A secure data access centre slated to open this fall
in Blusson Hall will give SFU researchers in the social
sciences a new way to access sensitive information
from national and provincial agencies.
“We’ll be housing within our facility a branch of the
regional data centre of Statistics Canada as well as
providing researchers access to other sensitive health
information,” says professor Michael Hayes, associate
dean of FHS, who has spent the past five years working
on the initiative.
The centre will offer researchers access to both
general population statistics and individual-level
information, although all data will be stripped of
information that would identify specific individuals.
Researchers will be able to access confidential data
sets from Statistics Canada as well as data collected
by various provincial ministries.
Hayes is excited about the potential research
outcomes. “We’ll get a better understanding,
through linking data sets, of what happens
to individual experiences across a range of
dimensions,” he says. “For example, what’s the
relationship between children with pre-existing
health problems and their educational attainment?
“We can try to improve health outcomes if we can
get a better appreciation of the ways in which health
data connects to other experiences in life.”
This kind of research facility is available at other
universities but will be a first for SFU thanks to stateof-the-art security built into the new building.
Hayes says researchers will only be admitted
to the facility after submitting an application
with their research questions and receiving
approval, including ethics approval.
Once inside the centre, they will have no link
to the outside world – no cell phones or laptops
are permitted, and no data will leave the facility
before it has been sent to appropriate oversight
committees to ensure that no privacy or ethics
regulations have been compromised.
SFN Sept 17.indd 3
It’s a building as innovative as the faculty it houses: Blusson Hall,
the greenest building on campus and home of the fledgling Faculty
of Health Sciences (FHS), officially opens Wednesday Sept. 17.
The $56.9-million three-storey complex is named for
Vancouver philanthropists Stewart and Marilyn Blusson
who contributed $12 million to the project.
Designed by Vancouver-based architects Busby, Perkins and Will, the
new building exceeds Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design
(LEED) Silver standards with numerous planet-friendly features such as
a green (planted) roof, sustainably harvested wood products, limited
use of off-gassing construction materials, storm-water collection
for irrigation, radiant-floor heating and abundant natural light.
The U-shaped building frames a tranquil courtyard that references
Arthur Erickson’s original design for the AQ gardens. Inside features
airy tiers of offices, classrooms and seminar rooms, a computing
lab and lecture theatre, and open-plan wet and dry labs that ensure
efficient use of research space and equipment. And a recent
$4-million gift from Vancouver developer Djavad Mowafaghian will
soon help build a containment lab for infectious disease research.
It’s a fitting shelter for the four-year-old FHS — “a unique
and logical extension of SFU’s commitment to excellence in
teaching and research in the fields of science, public policy and
interdisciplinary programs,” according to dean John O’Neil (above).
“Our cell-to-society focus in the areas of infectious disease,
environmental health, mental health and addictions, and global
health brings together experts from the social science, biomedical and
public health sectors. Together, they provide students with the skills
necessary to tackle pressing global issues and affect positive change
in the lives and health of people in Canada and around the world.”
That ability to “explore and understand connections at the
cellular, community and global level” is what convinced criminology
undergrad Benjamin Lee to pursue an extended minor in health
science. “It’s the only health sciences program in the country
to offer such a comprehensive interdisciplinary education.”
Bruce Lanphear, one of the dynamic new faculty recruits
(see feature p. 6), looks forward to “the new ideas coming
from young, fresh investigators.” He acknowledges that FHS
“is a new program still finding its way, but that just means it’s
wide open to innovation—not set in its ways. And that’s when
the most exciting and unpredictable things can happen.”
Global health student
finds empowerment
reduces AIDS
BY MARIANNE MEADAHL
Sex workers in the Indian city
of Mysore have a new outlook
on their personal health and
safety – and that is reducing the
number of HIV/AIDS cases.
The workers are reaping the
benefits of a new program that
is helping them to empower
themselves, says Katie
Brushett, a student in
SFU’s Global Health master’s
program who spent the summer
studying the program’s progress.
The sex workers belong to a collective called
Ashodaya, which means ‘dawn of hope.’ It’s a
community-based initiative funded by the Bill and
Melinda Gates Foundation. The organization helps
empower and mobilize high-risk groups in hopes of
reducing HIV rates.
“We spent much of the first month building a
rapport with the community,” says Brushett, noting
that the interaction, and her attempts to learn the
local language, enriched the interviews that followed.
See EMPOWERMENT on page 4.
Investigating how climate
change impacts health
The environment’s impact on health is huge, and a warming planet isn’t helping the
matter. Rising concerns about global climate change have researchers like Tim Takaro
trying to understand how its impact will affect people and their communities.
“Climate change is already affecting health around the world; last year
environmental refugees outnumbered all other refugees,” says Takaro, an associate
professor in health sciences at SFU.
Effects of climate change are also evident in B.C. and especially northern Canada,
he notes, pointing to growing concerns about water quality and air pollution (linked
to heart disease and decreased lung function), impacts on natural resources and
agriculture, as well as water-borne and vector-borne diseases.
See CLIMATE CHANGE on page 4.
9/16/08 12:28:09 PM
4
SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY NEWS ❙ WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 17, 2008
Exploring beyond the human genome
BY DIANE LUCKOW
Have you ever wondered why identical twins
become less similar as they age?
Gratien Prefontaine (above) could tell
you. As an assistant professor in the
Faculty of Health Sciences (FHS), he is
working on the latest frontier in a postgenetic era – epigenetics.
This new field studies everything outside
of the human genome that influences how
and when genes are expressed (turned on
or off), including environmental factors and
even diet.
In genetically identical twins, with each
exposed to different environments or diets
over time, differences in gene expression
can explain why only one twin may develop
schizophrenia or cancer, for example.
A Saskatchewan farm boy who originally
wanted an agricultural degree so that he
could learn to grow tomatoes that taste
fresh year-round, Prefontaine instead fell
in love with the university research lab. But
he draws a lot of parallels between bench
science and farming.
“You could design an experiment or plant
a crop to the best of abilities but factors
outside of your control can cause the
experiment or crop to fail,” he says. “It’s
tough; it’s 80 percent disappointment and
20 percent success – and that’s the best-
case scenario. There’s a lot of downtime
until you get things right, but when you do,
it’s very satisfying.”
Prefontaine earned a PhD in biochemistry
from the University of Ottawa before moving
to the University of California, San Diego
where he spent seven years as an assistant
project scientist in cellular molecular
medicine at the Rosenfeld Laboratory.
He joined FHS this year, attracted by the
opportunity to return to Canada and by the
faculty’s emphasis on global health. He
looks forward to making great discoveries
in epigenetics that could have far-reaching
implications for human biology and
disease, including cancer and aging.
Researcher
aims to shape
policy around
substance
abuse
BY DIANE LUCKOW
Benedikt Fischer’s research into
illicit substance abuse and its
consequences for public health and
policy is revealing startling new trends
that have yet to reach the radar of
public and mental health agencies.
“A lot of policy or everyday
practice or intervention happens on
a basis of outdated knowledge,” says
Fischer, recently recruited to SFU’s
Faculty of Health Sciences from the
University of Victoria. “We’re too often
shooting at the wrong target.”
Heroin has largely disappeared from
many city streets, he says, replaced by
prescription opioid analgesics (opium
derivatives like codeine or oxycontin used
in medical pain management) and crack
SFN Sept 17.indd 4
cocaine. Even in the general population,
prescription opioid abuse is becoming a
problem. Another major issue for public
health is cannabis, which one in seven
Canadian adults use at least occasionally,
and which can cause health problems or
risk for injuries.
Fischer’s goal is to sound the alarm
about what the major problems and
challenges are around illicit substance
use and to find ways to improve
practices, interventions and policies. He
works out of SFU’s Centre for Applied
Research, Mental Health and Addictions
(CARMHA) and also holds a Research
Chair in Applied Public Health cofunded by the Canadian Institutes of
Health Research (CIHR) and the Public
Health Agency of Canada (PHAC).
Joining the Faculty of Health Sciences,
with its emphasis on working across
disciplines, is one way to move his goal
forward, he says.
“I work quite a bit with clinical
people as well as basic scientists like
virologists. It’s quite important that we
collaborate on the key issues and I think
that epitomizes the faculty’s philosophy,
which is not to departmentalize but
to integrate basic science, clinical
science and social science.”
“I was really attracted to the spirit and
vision of the faculty,” he adds. “It embodies
on an institutional scale the kind of work I
aspire to do.”
CLIMATE CHANGE from page 3
Takaro’s latest research includes identifying the risks to
B.C. communities from climate-related hazards. Along with
colleagues in SFU’s new Climate Impacts research group it will
include identifying populations vulnerable to heat waves and air
pollution, and helping to identify public health efforts to reduce
related health effects in the province. It’s hoped that such
efforts can be applied elsewhere in the world.
Takaro, who is also a physician, studies disease susceptibility
factors in environmental as well as occupational health,
including inflammatory lung conditions such as asthma,
chronic beryllium disease and asbestosis.
He is currently part of a $12 million national
study investigating the rise in respiratory
illness in children. The Canadian Healthy
Infant Longitudinal Development
(CHILD) study hopes to determine
why, over the past three decades,
the illness has doubled in Canadian
children five to 18 years — and
quadrupled in low-income families.
Takaro and the team will track
5,000 children to determine what
role the environment may play.
Takaro also collaborated with U.S.
researchers to study a Seattle housing
development — and determined that
homes that were environmentally friendly
and designed with health in mind may reduce
asthma symptoms in children as much or more
than medication.
Takaro notes several links between asthma and climate
change with changes in pollen seasons and air pollution.
“Climate change is a really ‘big picture’ issue for public
health,” says Takaro,
“Yes, we need to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, but
we already know our children will inherit a warmer world. We
know there will be greater stress on the public health systems. I
don’t think we’re ready for these changes yet.”
EMPOWERMENT from page 3.
“In Mysore, sex work is street-based and the women work
out of rented rooms in lodges. Prior to the project, sex workers,
in fear of being identified as such, would not interact with one
another in the field. They had no idea of their legal rights or of
the health risks they were taking.”
Since the project began in 2004, there has been a complete
change, Brushett (above) notes.
“Ashodaya has mobilized approximately 1,600 sex workers.
They now have strong social networks and have taken charge of
their lives. All have come together under one umbrella and look
after one another like a family.
“I was most impressed with how the sex workers have taken
ownership over the project. The program’s technical team
bridged the scientific gaps, but the sex workers themselves have
been carrying out what needs to be done.”
That includes setting up a survey to compile baseline data
on HIV/AIDS prevalence rates. The workers were trained to
conduct interviews and take samples. “They’re building their
own capacity and strengthening their social solidarity,” says
Brushett. “They also see the importance of the process - and
the numbers dropping.”
The Global Health master’s program is aimed at students who
want to make a difference by improving population and public
health in developing countries.
“The program has given me a better understanding of the
factors that affect people’s health, especially in vulnerable
populations,” says Brushett, who plans to eventually attend
medical school at Australia’s University of Queensland.
9/16/08 12:28:13 PM
5
SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY NEWS ❙ WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 17, 2008
ABOUT THE FACULTY
Established in September 2004,
SFU’s Faculty of Health Sciences
offers Canada’s most comprehensive
program in population and public
health. Researchers and students from
disciplines as diverse as molecular
biology, epidemiology, geography,
political science and anthropology
work together on studies spanning
everything from the cell to society.
The faculty’s mission, says dean
John O’Neil, is to integrate social and
natural science research in order to
discover vital information about
population health on a global
scale – and then apply this
knowledge to develop
better public health
policies.
The faculty is also
committed to giving
students practical
opportunities to apply
their knowledge to health
problems in B.C. and
beyond.
The faculty currently has
34 faculty members and five
limited-term appointments, 512
health science majors, 141 graduate
students and 39 alumni.
Biggest AIDS drugs study nets
international attention
FOCUSING ON MENTAL
HEALTH AND CHILDREN
BY HELENA BRYAN
In Robert Hogg’s world, size matters. Oh yes, the bigger
the better. And no, we’re not talking bank accounts, carat
weights or parts of the anatomy.
We’re talking heavier stuff than that: large
epidemiological studies like the one he and colleagues
published July 26, 2008 in the venerable medical
journal Lancet, which asked a big question: What’s
the impact of AIDS drugs on life expectancy?
“The assumption used to be that you wouldn’t live
very long with HIV,” explains Hogg, a professor with
the Faculty of Health Sciences and the director of
the Population Health Program at the BC Centre for
Excellence in HIV/ADS. “But advances in AIDS drug
treatments during the past 30 years have turned what
used to be a fatal disease into a long-term chronic
condition and this study confirms that,” says Hogg.
The research begun in the 1990s, involving researchers
from Western Europe, the U.S. and Canada, is the biggest
on the subject to date. Results showed that a combination
A FULL ROSTER OF PROGRAMS
Undergraduate Programs:
The Bachelor of Arts in Health Sciences
and the Bachelor of Science in
Health Sciences are multidisciplinary
degrees with an overlapping focus
on population and public health. The
BSc offers three streams: general,
environmental and occupational
health, and infectious disease.
Graduate Programs:
The faculty currently offers a master’s
degree in public health (MPH)
that integrates core public health
knowledge with professional skills
to prepare graduates for leadership
positions in the population and public
health sector.
The MPH offers two options: an
interdisciplinary concentration across
a breadth of public health disciplines
and a concentration in global health.
The faculty is currently developing
additional graduate degree
concentrations.
Professional Credential:
The Diploma in Public Health is
of particular interest to clinicians,
international aid workers, publicpolicy analysts and others interested
in gaining more knowledge of current
challenges in global health practice
and research.
SFN Sept 17.indd 5
of antiretroviral drugs increases the life expectancy of
HIV patients in high-income countries by more than 13
years. The findings amount to a big leap forward for HIV
researchers, not to mention caregivers and patients.
They amount to big news. The Vancouver Sun, Global TV
and AFP, as well as news outlets further afield in South
Africa, Saudi Arabia and the Philippines, picked up the story.
Still, while global in scope with broad implications for
governments, the insurance industry and health care, the
study’s greatest consequence is the mind shift the results
will create for individuals infected with HIV, says Hogg.
“Imagine knowing that with the right mix of medication you
could live many years longer.”
Now, Hogg is planning a similar collaborative study
on life expectancy and AIDS in low-income countries,
where there are a number of confounding factors such
as Tuberculosis, poverty and a lack of resources. He
reiterates again the importance of size: “It’s only through
these collaborative cohorts that you can ask the big
questions,” he says. “The future of epidemiological
research in HIV really is in these large studies.”
The Faculty of Health Sciences
currently has two affiliated
research centres:
❙ Centre for Applied Research in
Mental Health and Addiction
(CARMHA)
This centre develops knowledge
and practices that will
enhance the effectiveness,
efficiency and quality of
mental health and addiction
resources. It also promotes
innovation, accountability
and inclusiveness in order to
improve mental health and
reduce substance abuse.
❙ Children’s Health Policy Centre
This research group integrates
education, research and policy
to improve children’s social
and emotional development
and their mental health. Its
work addresses determinants
of health, problem prevention
in children at risk and the
promotion of effective programs
and services.
“Our work supports and
complements the vision of the
Faculty of Health Sciences,” says
director Charlotte Waddell. “Which
is to integrate research and policy
for public and population health
locally, nationally and globally.”
Back-to-basics
research moves
HIV vaccine
forward
THREE CHAIRS FOR HEALTH
BY HELENA BRYAN
When Zabrina Brumme says her post-doctoral research at
Boston’s Harvard Medical School goes “back-to-basics,”
don’t start thinking Petri dishes and test tubes from
Science 101, nor that it’s a step backwards.
On the contrary, her research on HIV‘s sly “escape” from
the immune system combines the intricacies of molecular
biology, epidemiology and bioinformatics. It also
represents a major step toward the ultimate destination of
the HIV research community—an HIV vaccine.
“One of the major challenges to vaccine design is the
virus’s extreme mutational capacity,” says Brumme, who
joins the Faculty of Health Sciences in 2009 as assistant
professor. “If we can achieve a deeper understanding
of what types of immune responses are most effective
against HIV, how HIV mutates to “escape” these responses
and how immune escape influences the clinical course of
HIV, this is a step forward for HIV vaccine research.”
Collaborating with scientists from the BC Centre
for Excellence in HIV/AIDS, where she worked as an
undergraduate as well as a graduate student; researchers
at Harvard Medical School where she’s doing her post-
doc; as well as computational biologists at Microsoft
Research, Brumme used a supercomputer and an
algorithm to identify specific viral mutations allowing HIV
to hide from the body’s defences.
The results provide what researchers are calling a
“cheat sheet” of moves the virus can make. This cheat
sheet will give scientists an advantage in their quest to
create a vaccine against HIV because it allows them to
know which regions of the virus will trigger the immune
system and how the virus will mutate to evade this
response. “This is important,” Brumme explains, “because
vaccines succeed only when they stimulate an effective
immune response.”
While she believes a vaccine is a long way off yet—
especially in light of disappointing results from a major
trial last fall—she is optimistic that research like hers on
virus evolution is a necessary beginning step.
She’s looking forward to continuing her research in
Blusson Hall’s brand new labs. And who knows? At just
30 years old, she might see such research lead to a
successful HIV vaccine in her lifetime.
Distinguished research chairs in
the Faculty of Health Sciences:
❙ Molecular biologist Jamie Scott
holds a Tier 1 Canada Research
Chair in molecular immunity. She
is trying to develop a vaccine
against HIV-1, the AIDS virus.
❙ Associate professor Charlotte
Waddell holds a Tier 2 Canada
Research Chair in children’s
health policy. She is also
director of the Children’s Health
Policy Centre.
❙ Public health researcher
Benedikt Fischer holds a
Research Chair in Applied
Public Health co-funded by the
Canadian Institutes of Health
Research (CIHR) and the Public
Health Agency of Canada
(PHAC).
The faculty is currently recruiting
for a further five chair positions.
9/16/08 12:28:17 PM
Tom Kineshanko
6
The faces
behind the
names
SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY NEWS ❙ WEDNESDAY SEPTEMBER 17, 2008
Blusson Hall was named to honour SFU’s largest
private donation to date — $12 million from
Stewart and Marilyn Blusson (above left).
“Marilyn and I are interested in creating new
approaches for solving big health issues,” says
Stewart Blusson. “Rather than competing with
larger research institutions that have medical
schools, SFU has strategically focused on
research and education aimed at preventing
disease, rather than just curing it. This can
potentially improve the lives of millions of people
around the globe.”
Blusson is President of Archon Minerals Ltd.
His 1991 discovery of a diamond deposit in the
PROBING THE
SCIENCE OF
MENTAL HEALTH
BY FIONA BURROWS
Frank Lee likes to pick at people’s brains. Studying the
neurotransmitter dopamine, known to be involved in various mental
health diseases such as schizophrenia, intrigues the assistant
professor in the Faculty of Health Sciences. During his PhD studies
at the University of Toronto, followed with Harvard Medical School
post-graduate work at Children’s Hospital in Boston, he studied the
complexities of various neuropsychiatric brain disorders, including
drug addiction.
Recently he has been investigating dopamine at Toronto’s Centre
for Addiction and Mental Health. “My interests lie in investigating
how neurochemical imbalances occur by examining the biology
of the proteins involved,” says Lee. “By understanding how these
proteins normally function, we can examine what goes wrong in
these disorders or how to adjust the activity of
these proteins towards developing better
treatment.”
Lee will start working later this semester
in the mental health research laboratories
in Blusson Hall. “I was attracted to the
unique vision and great diversity within the
newest faculty at the university,” he says.
“SFU is contributing to positive change in
the world by providing quality education
for students and supporting research.”
Lee says it is important to look
outside the laboratory walls and conduct
collaborative research that ignites
discussion of ideas, develops synergies
and encompasses different perspectives
about research. “On occasion, our
research projects produce questions
that may require experimentation and/
or technologies that are outside our
expertise.”
He hopes his research will lead to more
effective and specific therapies that have
global benefits for those suffering from
mental health disorders.
SFN Sept 17.indd 6
Northwest Territories led to the creation of the
country’s first operational diamond mine and
spawned a burgeoning Canadian industry.
The two most public spaces in Blusson Hall —
the Djavad Mowafaghian Atrium and the Djavad
Mowafaghian Lecture Theatre — were named to
honour a $4-million gift from Djavad Mowafaghian
(above right). His donation will improve the
lives of children worldwide by providing $2.5
million to support research in children’s health
policy and $1.5 million to construct and outfit
a level 3 containment laboratory for infectious
disease research. “Children are one of the most
important investments that we can make,”
says Mowafaghian. “They are the foundation
of our society and need to be healthy to learn.
Health and education are basic human rights,
essential for a happy and productive life.”
Mowafaghian earned his fortune as a
developer in Iran before moving to Vancouver
in 1987. Over the past 30 years, he has
demonstrated his passion for “giving back”
by funding various philanthropic projects and
donating to various charities throughout the
world. In 2003, he created and funded the
Djavad Mowafaghian Foundation to guarantee
the continuation of his philanthropy.
MAKING A
DIFFERENCE
TO CHILDREN’S
HEALTH
BY JULIE OVENELL-CARTER
How will Bruce Lanphear measure success in his new position
as professor of children’s environmental health in the Faculty of
Health Sciences?
His answer is only half-joking: “I like to say that one of my
goals is to work myself out of a job.”
Recently arrived from Ohio where he was the director of the
Cincinnati Children’s Environmental Health Center at Cincinnati
Children’s Hospital, Lanphear holds degrees in medicine, and
public health and tropical medicine.
A leading researcher in his field, Lanphear’s numerous
population-based studies have confirmed that widespread
exposures to environmental toxicants such as lead and tobacco
have a demonstrably negative effect on children’s intellectual,
behavioral and physical development.
“I didn’t actually start out wanting to be a researcher,” says
the 45-year-old epidemiologist and father of three daughters. “I
wanted to make a difference to public health. I wanted to help
shape policy.”
That desire to “serve the public and community” is key to
understanding Lanphear’s decision to uproot his young family
and relocate across the border to Canada’s west coast.
“There was a lot to keep us in Cincinnati—I had an endowed
chair and had received more than $17 million in research
awards. But about three years ago I started to become
discouraged by the social and political climate in the US. I saw
research becoming increasingly corporatized, and industry
interests contaminating the research process.”
Coincidentally, Lanphear came to SFU as a visiting professor
in 2006. Intrigued by “the radical history of SFU” and “the bright
future” of the nascent Faculty of Health Sciences, he eventually
decided SFU might offer a better academic fit.
“There is a tremendous enthusiasm for children’s health
research and policy in Canada,” notes Lanphear, “But currently
there is a lack of expertise in the area of children’s health and
the environment. I’m hoping to help make this kind of science
more accessible to the broader public so they can make
informed decisions.”
His first course—Children’s Health and the Environment
(HSC1473)—debuts in the spring of 2009, and he is already
considering the scope of his first Canadian research project.
“One of the possibilities is a study of how exposures to
environmental toxins elevate the risk of children developing
ADHD or autistic behaviours, comparable to one I am currently
directing in the U.S.”
9/16/08 12:28:25 PM