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Ryerson professor and molecular cell biologist Roberto Botelho is searching for answers. With his research team of 11 students and newly awarded funds from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Botelho is examining the role that cell degradation plays in eliminating pathogens and disease prevention. It is hoped this research will provide insight into the regulation of the immune system, leading to the development of novel strategies to mitigate infectious and/or autoimmune conditions.

A professor in the Faculty of Science, Roberto Botelho and his team are starting at the beginning, examining organelles, which are considered to be the organs of the cell. They are researching how a cell uses genetic information to create, maintain and change organelles. In May of this year, he was awarded a CIHR operating grant for nearly half a million dollars, to be used over five years, to further his research on this specific cell function. The team believes that these organelle changes may hold the key to understanding how the immune system responds to infection, thereby strengthening the human immune system.

"It's important that we learn how our bodies work and understand the mechanisms of what happens when things go wrong, for example, when diseases develop," says Botelho.

Within a resting white blood cell are organelles called lysosomes. Globular in nature, lysosomes are the organelles which are responsible for cell degradation. When the cell takes in food molecules, they are processed by the lysosomes, which break them down into raw elements so new proteins can be made. Because they are so degradative and so acidic in nature, lysosomes are also used by the immune cells to destroy bacteria. When they are exposed to bacterial products, the lysosomes undergo a transformation, known as "tubulation" where they become tubular in shape.

This occurrence was first discovered in the 1970s; however, very little additional research has been done since.  Seeing an opportunity to explore this phenomenon, Botelho sought funding to engage in further lysosome research resulting in the recent CIHR grant, which was the top ranked grant application by the Cell Physiology panel.

"We want to learn about how the process works, which is really a change in lysosome identity. While there is indirect evidence that tubular lysosomes are involved in degrading bacteria and activating the immune system, we just do not know if this is true - figuring this out is our most immediate goal."  
The CIHR grant will allow the team to characterize and understand how lysosomes tubulate, a process that's critical to helping researchers identify what is happening to cells and the immune response. Botelho hopes that examining this process will provide insight into the regulation of the immune system, leading to the development of strategies to mitigate infectious and/or autoimmune conditions.

In addition, Botelho was recently awarded the CIHR Maud Menten New Investigator Prize, which is awarded annually to the highest-ranking grant application from a new principal investigator (those with less than five years experience). This additional funding will help Botelho support his students, hire a research technician and provide all the materials and reagents to support his student research team. Botelho received this award at the 11th Annual CIHR meeting for New Principal Investigators in October in Mont-Gabriel, Quebec.

A paper on their current research was published in the September 2012 edition of Traffic, a journal that documents cell biology and biochemistry of intracellular transport in health and disease.