Replacement for Anaerobic Workstations

肠道环境承载了数量可观的细菌和病毒，形成了稳定的群落。最近的几项研究表明，这些细菌和病毒群落的变化与某些健康状况有关。细菌和病毒也以多种方式调节肠道免疫系统，但它们这样做的机制仍然知之甚少。因此，了解细菌及其相关病毒如何相互作用以及它们如何影响宿主的生理和免疫学是很重要的。肠道的大部分通常是缺氧的。因此，许多重要的肠道细菌不能在氧气的存在下生长，即使是微量的氧气对它们来说也是有毒的。因此，如果我们想要研究细菌和病毒对肠道微生物群落和宿主免疫的作用和影响，在完全缺氧的情况下生长细菌和病毒的能力至关重要。实现这一目标的最佳方法是使用特殊的橱柜，其中的空气被特殊气体严格控制，以去除任何微量的氧气。这些橱柜配有手套接口，可以将手臂插入其中操纵细菌，而不会将它们暴露在致命的氧气中。申请人目前进行的研究项目需要每天使用这样的橱柜来培养细菌，分离和传播感染它们的病毒，并处理粪便样本以分离特定的肠道细菌，氧气对这些细菌有很高的毒性。此应用程序的目标是更换两个12年和14年的橱柜，这些橱柜要么坏了，无法修复，要么因为十多年的密集使用而严重磨损。我们的旧橱柜是舍布鲁克大学健康校园里唯一可用的橱柜。因此，涉及仅在缺氧条件下生长的微生物的研究完全依赖于这些橱柜。不能替代它们将对我们的研究项目造成灾难性的后果。它还将严重损害依赖这些设备的地方和国际合作。在过去的15年里，我们的内阁培养了50多名研究生和本科生以及研究专业人员。它还允许在自然科学和工程领域发表几篇研究论文。在加拿大，研究肠道病毒和宿主先天免疫的研究小组相对较少，因此申请人所从事的研究项目非常重要。研究成果将有助于解决基本的生物学问题，这将使加拿大人民以及更广泛的科学界受益。

The gut environment hosts an impressive number of bacteria and viruses that form stable communities. Several recent studies have shown that changes in these bacterial and viral communities are associated with certain health conditions. Bacteria and viruses also modulate the intestinal immune system in multiple ways, but the mechanisms by which they do this are still poorly understood. It is therefore important to understand how bacteria and their associated viruses interact with each other and how they can affect the physiology and immunology of their host. Most parts of the intestinal tract are generally exempt of oxygen. Consequently, many important gut bacteria cannot grow in the presence of oxygen, which is often toxic to them even in trace amounts. The capacity to grow bacteria and viruses in total absence of oxygen is therefore crucial if we want to investigate their role and impact on intestinal microbial communities and host immunity. The best way to achieve this is by using special cabinets within which the air is tightly controlled with special gases to remove any trace oxygen. These cabinets are equipped with glove ports that allow insertion of the arms inside to manipulate bacteria, without exposing them to lethal oxygen. The research programs currently conducted by the applicants require the daily use of such cabinets to grow bacteria, to isolate and propagate viruses infecting them, and to process fecal samples to isolate specific gut bacteria for which oxygen is highly toxic. The goal of this application is to replace two 12 and 14 years old cabinets that are either broken and not repairable, or heavily worn because of intensive usage for more than a decade. Our old cabinets are the only ones available for research on the health campus at U. Sherbrooke. Therefore, research involving microorganisms that grow only in absence of oxygen totally depends on these cabinets. Failure to replace them will have disastrous consequences on our research programs. It will also heavily impair local and international collaborations that depend on this equipment. Our cabinets allowed training of >50 graduate and undergraduate students as well as research professionals over the last 15 years. It also allowed publication of several research articles in natural sciences and engineering. There are relatively few research groups in Canada that study gut viruses and host innate immunity and the research programs pursued by the applicants are therefore highly important. The research outcome will help resolve fundamental biological questions that will benefit the Canadian population as well as the broader scientific community.