Course Coordinators:
Drs. Nahuel Fittipaldi and Roberto Melano
Tel: (647) 792 3429 - Email: nahuel.fittipaldi@oahpp.ca
Tel: (647) 792 3430 - Email: roberto.melano@oahpp.ca
Course Objectives:
With particular emphasis on new laboratory techniques, the goal of this course is to provide students with the scientific basis for how these techniques help us understand the epidemiology of infectious diseases, their current impact on human medicine and their role in the detection and characterization of etiologic agents causing diseases.
The major course objectives are:
 To learn the common microorganisms associated with specific clinical diseases.
 To understand how genomics and proteomics have been applied to the diagnosis, control and
 management of infectious diseases.
To provide knowledge of both practical and theoretical aspects of the specialist area of medical microbiology and the necessary skills to undertake individual and collaborative research in this field.
 To be introduced to recently developed and constantly improving techniques such as new generation sequencing and high resolution proteomics and how they can impact our understanding and control of important infectious diseases.
Curriculum:
Molecular Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases is a course that provides an introduction to medical bacteriology, virology, mycology and parasitology. The course consists of lectures from specialists in each topic, and discussions on selected papers. Students should be familiarized with concepts pertaining to basic molecular biology principles and techniques for understanding various contemporary areas of research in clinical microbiology and their applications. This programme covers these areas, together with training in research skills.
Prerequisite:
A background in infectious diseases, microbiology and molecular biology is expected.
Evaluation and Guidelines:
 35% of the mark will be based on a student presentation of a current research paper.
 35% will be based on a take-home research proposal (maximum 5 pages in length) including the following sections: (I) Background & Rationale, (II) Hypothesis & Significance, and (III) Research

Design & Methods, that will involve critical and creative thinking (report will be due 60 days after assignment).
20% will be based on two written critiques of scientific papers discussed in lectures.
 10% of the mark will be based on participation.
(Note: late submissions will incur a penalty of a 5% reduction in marks for each day late.)
Course Format and Guidelines:

Each class will be structured as follows (3h session per week):
1.
Introductory lecture # 1 by a professor (40 min + up to 5 min question period).
2.
One student will present a pre-assigned paper (20 min). This will be followed by a question from a student in the audience assigned to write a critique on the paper in advance (these critiques should be collected by the professor before the start of each class). The professor will then ask the presenter up to two questions. The entire question period should be less than 10 min. The professor will lead a general discussion on the topic and engage students at the end of the class.
3.
Coffee break 5 to 10 min.
4.
Introductory lecture # 2 by a professor (40 min + up to 5 min question period).
5.
As described in 2 (above), the second student will present a pre-assigned paper (20 min).
This will be followed by a question from a student in the audience assigned to write a critique on the paper in advance (these critiques should be collected by the professor before the start of each class). The professor will then ask the presenter up to two questions. The entire question period should be less than 10 min. The professor will lead a general discussion on the topic and engage students at the end of the class.
Additional Guidelines:
For PowerPoint presentations, students are expected to start with a background to the field, describe the methods used, and carefully analyze data (from specific experiments to overall meaning of findings/major advances). Whenever possible, presenters should identify limitations, suggest additional required experiments, and highlight/propose future directions. Students are also expected to prepare high quality slides to ensure effective communication of material to faculty and peers. For the written critiques, students are expected to follow a similar overall structure to present a critical analysis of the paper. For the take-home research proposal, students will be assigned one specific topic and will prepare a 5 page report according to provided guidelines.

Preliminary schedule and themes covered by the course (1 – 4) and lecture topics:
Theme Date Lecture Title
Introduction January 14, 2015 The perpetual challenge of infectious diseases
1. Infectious
January 21, 2015
Bioinformatics and clinical genomics disease and high-
Genomics applied to the study of bacterial epidemics
New generation sequencing strategies applied to pathogen discovery throughput approaches
January 28, 2015
To be confirmed
General Introduction to molecular typing and epidemiology
February 4, 2015
2.
Epidemiology,
Medical
Surveillance &
Clinical
Diagnostics
February 11, 2015
February 18, 2015
To be confirmed
Routine and emerging methods of pathogen identification
To be confirmed
To be confirmed
Molecular methods applied to food safety
3. Antibiotics and microbial resistance
Molecular surveillance of Influenza viruses
February 25, 2015
March 4, 2015
Discovery of new antimicrobial agents
Molecular testing in routine clinical microbiology laboratories: an epidemiologist’s perspective
Molecular evolution of antimicrobial resistance in Neisseria gonorrhoeae
March 11, 2015 Molecular dissemination of antibiotic resistance
4. Vaccines March 18, 2015
Structure-based reverse vaccinology
Molecular microbiology and vaccine development
Speaker
(starting time)
John McLaughlin
(9:30)
John Nash
(9:30)
Nahuel Fittipaldi
(11)
Samir Patel
(9:30)
(11)
George Broukhanski
(9:30)
(11)
Julianne Kus
(9:30)
(11)
(9:30)
Gustavo Mallo
(11)
Jonathan Gubbay
(9:30)
Gerry Wright
(11)
Allison McGeer
(9:30)
Vanessa Allen
(11)
Roberto Melano
(9:30)
Jeffrey Lee
(9:30)
Scott Gray-Owen
(11)