Category Archives: News

The Bowdish lab welcomes Chris Verschoor, Fiona Whelan, Mike Dorrington & Tanja Thurn.

Posted on by

The Bowdish lab is undergoing massive expansion at the moment & we’re thrilled to welcome our new post-doc, Chris Verschoor. Chris recently graduated with a PhD from Guelph and since Guelph trains the best students, we were happy to scoop him up. (Full disclosure: Dawn graduated from Guelph).

Fiona is a MSc student with a computer science degree from Waterloo, who will be bringing her bioinformatic skills to the wet lab.

Mike is also a MSc student who has recently graduated from beautiful UBC (Full disclosure: Dawn did her PhD there & dreams of going back), spent a month in Ecuador & is now hard at work.

In other graduate student news, Zhongyuan Tu, the first member of the Bowdish lab and former thesis student is now a MSc student. We’re delighted that he’s chosen to stay on.

Tanja Thurn brings years of experience as a medical technologist to the Bowdish lab & she will be  tackling some of our technology issues and will be a resource to all.

Welcome to all the new members of our team!

Grant Bonanza!

Posted on by

The Bowdish lab has received funding from the CIHR (Pilot Projects in Aging) with Dr. Jennie Johnstone to study how macrophage immunosenescence contributes to susceptibility to pneumonia in the elderly. We have also received funding from the Ontario Thoracic Society/Ontario Lung Association for our work on the role of scavenger receptors in mycobacterial infection and funding from the CIHR (Emerging Team: Human Microbiome, with Drs Mike Surette, Jennie Johnstone, Mike Schryvers, & James Kellner) to study the role of commensal bacteria (including close cousins of S. pneumoniae) contribute to upper respiratory tract infections. This is truly an exciting time for the Bowdish lab – stay tuned for some fantastic science!

Dawn receives funding from the Ontario Research Funding – Research Infrastructure

Posted on by

This morning Ted McMeekin, MPP for Ancaster-Dundas-Flamborough-Westdale, Patrick Deane, president of McMaster, and Mo Elbestawi, the University’s vice-president, Research & International Affairs announced that McMaster University researchers, including Dr. Bowdish were successful in their applications for research infrastructure funding from the Ontario government.

The funding that Dawn has received will be used to expand and support her lab’s research into discovering novel immunomodulatory therapies for infectious disease that will be essential for combatting antibiotic resistant bacteria.

For the McMaster Daily News article click here.

For a description of the project click here.

(Position filled Sept 14 2010) Post-doctoral position in Immunosenescence Available

Posted on by

Would you like to build your career exploring the immunology of aging?

In the Western world the majority (>90%) of deaths due to pneumonia occur in the elderly. Why they are at such high risk is not entirely clear, but presumably immunosenescence (age related changes in the immune system) is a key factor.  The high mortality rate is compounded by co-infections, such as influenza infection. This research project involves developing a mouse model of Streptococcus pneumoniae colonization and infection in aged mouse and determining how co-infection with influenza increases the risk of developing pneumonia. This will include a both a basic science component (i.e. deteremining how age-associated changes in immunity contribute to susceptibility to infection) and a translational component (i.e. testing therapeutic interventions).

An immediate post-doctoral opportunity is available for a creative scientist with a strong commitment to excellence and innovation to pursue leading edge research in immunology. Although this is presently only a 1 year position, this may be extended if the applicant obtains fellowship funding. Candidates with experience in virology or mouse models of infection are especially encouraged to apply.

The position is in the Department of Pathology & Molecular Medicine at McMaster University located in the heart of the Golden Horseshoe in southern Ontario.  McMaster University has been ranked as one of Canada’s most research intensive universities known for it’s highly collaborative and mentoring atmosphere.

Interested candidates should send a CV, cover letter and three references to Dr. Dawn Bowdish (bowdish@mcmaster.ca, www.bowdish.ca).

NSERC announces new PDF fellowship award.

Posted on by

For all you potential PDFs, here’s the news from NSERC…

“Applications open soon for prestigious new PDF program

Budget 2010 announced that the three granting agencies would establish a new and prestigious postdoctoral fellowships program to attract top-level talent to Canada. The program is designed to be internationally competitive, with 70 new two-year fellowships, valued at $70,000 each per year, to be awarded on an annual basis. The first fellowships will be awarded in 2010–11.

As the program details are finalized over the coming months, NSERC, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council will communicate updates regularly to the university and researcher communities. Updates will also be posted to the agencies’ Web sites as they become available.”

Applications open soon for prestigious new PDF program
Budget 2010 announced that the three granting agencies would establish a new and prestigious postdoctoral fellowships program to attract top-level talent to Canada. The program is designed to be internationally competitive, with 70 new two-year fellowships, valued at $70,000 each per year, to be awarded on an annual basis. The first fellowships will be awarded in 2010–11.
As the program details are finalized over the coming months, NSERC, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council will communicate updates regularly to the university and researcher communities. Updates will also be posted to the agencies’ Web sites as they become avail

The Bowdish lab welcomes Iris Wang & Alicja Puchta

Posted on by

The Bowdish lab is thrilled to welcome two new members, Iris Wang (technician) and Alicja Puchta (PhD student). Iris brings with her years of experience at McMaster and elsewhere and is quickly whipping the lab into shape. Alicja has just finished a very productive MSc with Dr. William Sheffield at McMaster and will be tackling the big issue of how our immune system declines with age. Welcome Iris & Alicja!

Post-doctoral Position Available in Immunosenescence (position filled April 30,2010)

Posted on by

Have you ever wondered how we age?

Would you like to build your career exploring the immunology of aging?

An immediate post-doctoral opportunity is available for a creative scientist with a strong commitment to excellence and innovation in science to pursue leading edge research in human immunology. The position is in the Department of Pathology & Molecular Medicine at McMaster University located in the heart of the Golden Horseshoe in southern Ontario.  McMaster University has been ranked as one of Canada’s most research intensive universities known for it’s highly collaborative and mentoring atmosphere.

The research area focuses on understanding the immune changes associated with aging, with a particular emphasis on the role of immunosenescence on the ability of human monocytes and macrophages to respond to Streptococcus pneumoniae. In conjunction to these studies methodological work on identified biomarkers will be carried out and tested using samples from clinical outcome studies.

This position also provides the opportunity to engage in Canada’s largest cohort study on aging. The Canadian Longitudinal Study on Aging (CLSA) (www.clsa-elcv.ca) is a national longitudinal study of adult development and aging that will follow 50,000 Canadians between the ages of 45 and 85 years at baseline over a 20-year period. Data will be collected every 3 years through interviews and 30,000 participants will also have a clinical assessment and collection of biological samples creating a national biobank and research platform.

Two enthusiastic researchers, Drs. Cynthia Balion and Dawn Bowdish, will supervise this position. In addition, the post-doctoral fellow will work with experts spanning the research continuum from discovery, to epidemiology, and translational science.

Interested candidates should send a CV, cover letter and three references to Dr. Dawn Bowdish (bowdish@mcmaster.ca, www.bowdish.ca).

We’re back online (2010-02-26).

Posted on by

A calamity at the company who does our web hosting took us offline for a week, but it was gratifying to hear from so many people “Hey, did you know that your webpage is down?”.  We now know that the website is being looked at! As a teaser for our followers: it’s been a week of many lab developments, which will be posted after this next grant deadline (March1st).

The Bowdish lab recieves CFI funding

Posted on by

The Bowdish lab has received CFI (Canada Foundation for Innovation) funding for infrastructure for her project “Drug development in a post-antibiotic world”. This infrastructure grant ($350,000) will allow her to build a new tissue culture suite, purchase new molecular biology equipment, upgrade the facilities at the high throughput screening lab and Biophotonics unit, all of which will be required to accommodate her expanding lab and to allow her to discover novel “immunomodulators”, that is drugs that enhance the immune response and fight infectious disease.
See the article on McMaster’s Daily News here and in the Hamilton Spectator here.