This story originally published on April 21, 2015 in observance of the COPH’s 30^th anniversary celebration.

Three Distinguished USF Health Professors in the Department of Global Health at the USF College of Public Health – Drs. Tom Unnasch, John Adams and Dennis Kyle – are ranked among the university’s best externally-funded investigators in terms of research dollars, and two are in the top five. A major focus of their research is malaria.

A fourth Global Health professor, Dr. Michael White, published a groundbreaking study just last month that may revolutionize the global fight against malaria.

Unnasch, the department chair, said much of Global Health’s research funding comes from external grants from the National Institutes of Health, primarily the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has come through with what he called “a substantial portfolio of funding”: a $4.5-million grant to Adams this year for developing new drugs and researching new genetic targets for malaria.

Kyle and Adams also have established collaborations with the Draper Laboratory to conduct research with artificial livers to study malaria in livers, which also is funded by the Gates Foundation, Unnasch said.

The combination of expertise and generous funding has helped put the department on the global cutting edge and in the thick of international connections that will help keep it there.

“The department is becoming quite well-known now as a research institution for malaria and other vector-borne diseases,” Unnasch said. “We have lots of good collaborations with people in Thailand at Mahidol University, and a lot of collaborations with people in Africa. There’s also quite a bit of contact between our department and people in the mosquito control field here in the state of Florida.”

Unnasch said those include regular work with the Florida Mosquito Control Association (of which Unnasch is on the board of directors), the Department of Health Laboratories, the Florida Department of Health, and various research projects with mosquito control in Hillsborough, Pasco, Manatee, Volusia and St. Johns counties, as well as with the Florida Keys Mosquito Control District in Monroe County.

For mosquito researchers, Unnasch said, the reason is obvious. For everyone else, it might be alarming.

“Florida’s the best place in the country if you want to do research on mosquito-transmitted diseases,” he said. “There are four arthropod-borne viruses, or arbovirus, infections that occur in the United States, and three out of the four are endemic to Florida. That’s why Florida spends $75-100 million a year on mosquito control. Only California spends more.”

Last month, the College of Public Health made headlines as Dr. Michael White, a professor in the College of Public Health’s Department of Global Health and the Morsani College of Medicine’s Department of Molecular Medicine, led a team of researchers that became the first to uncover part of the mysterious process by which malaria-related parasites spread at explosive and deadly rates inside humans and other animals.

As drug-resistant malaria threatens to become a major public health crisis, the findings could potentially lead to a powerful new treatment for malaria-caused illnesses that kill more than 600,000 people a year.

In a study published online March 3 in the high-impact journal PLOS Biology, the USF researchers and their colleagues at the University of Georgia discovered how these ancient parasites manage to replicate their chromosomes up to thousands of times before spinning off into daughter cells with perfect similitude – all the while avoiding cell death.

Malaria caused about 207 million cases and 627,000 deaths in 2012, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  About 3.2 billion people, or nearly half the world’s population, are at risk of malaria, according to the World Health Organization.

White said that this study, which he called the first for a USF Health laboratory in publishing original research in PLOS Biology, will help get more potential treatments in the pipeline.

“The more we understand their vulnerability,” he said of the parasites, “the better chance we can keep that pipeline full.”

With the collective efforts and expertise of Drs. Adams, Kyle, Unnasch and White, the USF College of Public Health will remain on the front lines of the fight against one of the world’s most daunting health threats.

Related stories:
USF-led study sheds light on how malaria parasites grow exponentially
New antimalarial drug with novel mechanism of action
Dr. Dennis Kyle receives NIH award to understand extreme drug resistance in malaria
Dr. John Adams leads workshop for Gates Foundation scientists conducting malaria research

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Dr. Ben Jacob, a USF College of Public Health (COPH) research assistant professor, has received a $25,000 grant from the Joy McCann Foundation, a Tampa-based nonprofit charitable organization. The money will be used to research the use of artificial intelligence and drones in the fight against mosquito larvae in Hillsborough County. 

Jacob, an expert in spatial modeling, an analytical process that uses geographical information systems (GIS) to simulate real-world, real-time conditions, was approached by the Hillsborough County mosquito abatement team looking to identify mosquito habitats in the area’s discarded rubber tires. Mosquitoes—including those that carry the Zika and West Nile viruses and Dengue fever—lay their eggs in wastewater, the kind that tends to collect in buckets, cups, bottles, planters and tire wells.

After locating a nearby tire containing mosquito larvae, Jacob flew a drone over it, capturing its spectral signature—the reflective energy and wavelengths that radiate off the tire—on a cell phone. Using that information along with satellite data, he created a spatial map, showing where there are apt to be other mosquito eggs resting in abandoned tires.

“We identified over 2,000 mosquito habitats in these waste tires,” said Jacob. “And I never actually left my office to find them. It was all done with automation. Can you imagine how long it would have taken to find 2,000-plus habitats with ground troops? Weeks.”

Efficiency is just one of the many benefits of using artificial intelligence to locate mosquito habitats, says Jacob, who has used similar technology to combat mosquitoes in Manatee County and disease-causing vectors in Africa. 

“Once we have a location that’s been predicted by this artificial intelligence, we can target insecticide right to that area,” he explained. “We can even use the drones to precisely drop the insecticide.” 

According to Jacob, this kind of drone-delivered mosquito control costs the county less money (using helicopters and pilots can cost a county millions per year) and provides more effective results. 

“We’re flying the drone about a foot over the habitat,” noted Jacob. “It’s a bulls-eye every time. And we can use less insecticide, which is better for the environment and reduces the risk of the mosquitoes building up a tolerance to it.”

Jacob is using part of the grant money to develop an app mosquito-control personnel can use to find larval habitats.

“I can synthesize all these algorithms and network systems into the app, so personnel from the abatement teams can use it, no PhD required!” he said. “This technology can help us create a real-time larval control system that can be deployed within minutes. This is so much more time and cost effective. Using technology to advance epidemiological intelligence—and public health in general—is simply a no-brainer.”

Story by Donna Campisano, USF College of Public Health

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Traditional mosquito abatement programs, which generally call for the spraying of insecticides across widespread areas via helicopters, can be expensive and imprecise. Manatee County, looking for a more effective and less-costly strategy to combat flood water or “nuisance” mosquitos, turned to experts at the USF College of Public Health (COPH) who’ve researched and used drone technology in combatting malaria-carrying mosquitos in parts of Africa and Asia.

“What you can do from the ground, walking around with a GPS, a drone can do in seconds,” said Dr. Ben Jacob, a COPH research assistant professor who specializes in spatial modeling, an analytical process that uses geographical information systems (GIS) to simulate real-world, real-time conditions. “Treating nuisance mosquitos and vectors can cost counties upward of $4 million. What we’re saying is why take so much taxpayer money and put it toward expensive helicopters when you can use a drone, which can be even more effective. Helicopters are wide, but you have a narrow frame with a drone, so it’s easily maneuverable in difficult locations. A drone can go under canopy cover, for example, and we can get optimal angles just a few feet from the ground. It allows us to do precision targeting. Many of the abatement districts understand the privilege they would have using a drone. It’s cost effective—it can be as little $500.”

So how does the drone know which locations to survey? The first step is to send the drone up over a known habitat, programming it to capture as much imagery as possible, including the wavelengths the area is emitting. Using that data, researchers create what’s called a “shape file” and overlay it onto a digital satellite to map out other areas similar to it. Ground troops may then go into the area to determine if, indeed, it is a mosquito habitat.   Jacob has been joined on his Manatee County mosquito-tracking mission by the COPH’s Dr. Robert Novak, a professor and vectorborne disease expert, doctoral candidate Nathanael Stanley and Sriram Chellappan, a USF associate professor of computer science and engineering.

Once habitats are detected, the use of insecticides can be directed to exactly where they’re needed. That’s important, says Jacob, as overuse of insecticides can cause resistance and application from high altitudes can be affected by wind and drift. “With a drone, we can get to within a foot of the habitat and apply insecticide exactly where the vector is,” he said. While Jacob and his colleagues are working with Manatee County mosquito-control professionals, there’s no reason why the same technology can’t be used throughout Florida, and even the world.

“It’s quick and accurate and it’s been a phenomenal success,” remarked Jacob. “We’ve been using it in other larval control programs for malaria and onchocerciasis [river blindness] in Rwanda and Uganda, and now Cameroon is interested in some of our work. When you add to technology, you get noticed. We’re showing them that we have another methodology more powerful and less expensive than using helicopters.”

Story by Donna Campisano, USF College of Public Health

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In July, four USF College of Public Health (COPH) graduate students traveled to Indonesia to take part in the “Community Participation in Public Health” course offered by Diponegoro University in Semarang.

This is the first collaboration between the college and Diponegoro University, made possible by Dr. Hanifa Denny, a COPH alumna who’s now a faculty member at Diponegoro’s School of Public Health, Dr. Tom Mason, a COPH professor of epidemiology, and others at the COPH.

The college funded the students’ program fees, airfare and materials for the 10-day course.

“As a fully online student who does not get to interact with students or faculty on a day-to-day basis, a program centered on community participation in public health really appealed to me,” said Ashleigh Berke, a COPH MPH student. “I was also interested because, although my concentration is epidemiology, my professional background is in health education and community health. The course gave me an opportunity to merge by current interests with my experience.”

Semarang has a universal health care system with a heavy emphasis on community-run programs. Throughout the 10 days, students attended lectures and visited health care sites, such as community health centers, a regional health office and a tuberculosis clinic. They observed a prenatal class taught by community members, visited a health care center catering to mothers and their young children (called a posyandu) and toured a center that turns recycled plastic into products, such as key chains and water bottle holders, that are later sold.

They also took part in a mosquito-control surveillance project.

“We walked with volunteers around neighborhoods checking water sources for mosquito larvae, which can spread dengue fever,” said Grace Collins, who recently graduated with her MPH in epidemiology and global communicable disease. “It was beautiful to see how the community worked together to run different health care centers. To see the care within the community was inspiring.”

Community health care workers in Indonesia―who receive about a week’s training from the government―work as volunteers, with absolutely no financial incentive.

“That’s something that really stood out to me,” said Chinyere Reid, a PhD candidate studying community and family health. “These health workers are highly regarded by their community, so that’s one incentive. But it’s also a cultural thing.” “In Indonesia, they have this idea that health is a community responsibility,” added Dorothea Polk, who’s studying for her MPH in health care organizations and management. “Health is a group effort, and they take it seriously. Having healthy neighbors reflects well upon you. It was interesting to witness the impact a community can make in the way care is delivered.”

How will the experience help the students in their public health careers?

“My focus is on health care organizations,” explained Polk. “In the U.S., health care can be viewed as a business, but in Indonesia, the focus is on people. As I move forward, I’m going to see how I can apply the techniques and values I learned from this program to the U.S. health care system.”

Story by Donna Campisano, USF College of Public Health

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Educating the public about the ways that the Zika virus is carried in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes is the primary goal of Robert Novak, PhD, professor at the USF College of Public Health Department of Global Health. In September, Novak joined a panel of a dozen city, county, transportation and tourism leaders at the Hillsborough County Center to share the specifics about the certain type of mosquito that carries the virus.

“The Aedes aegypti mosquito is public enemy number one,” Dr. Novak said. “The best way to prevent against the transmission of the Zika virus is to find where they are located and get rid of them.”

Understanding that this species of mosquito is quite different than over 350 other types of mosquitoes is integral to knowing how to control them, according to Dr. Novak.

“They lay their eggs in small pools of water; containers, flowers and flower pots and especially tires and refuse,” he said. “They are not the type that will inhabit and reproduce in ditches and large ponds of water. The most important step in preventing the larvae growth is to ‘spill’ the water every five to seven days, not let it sit.”

Robert Novak, PhD, USF College of Public Health professor, researches the Aedes aegypti mosquito and describes how they are different from all other mosquitoes.

Dr. Novak shared images of the primary locations where the Aedes aegypti mosquitoes breed, including old tires, flower pots, kiddie pools, and anywhere that small amounts of water gathers in shady areas.

The discussion panel included Hillsborough County Commissioner Lesley Miller, representatives from the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office, the Hillsborough School district, The University of Tampa, MacDill Air Force Base and tourism leaders. The Mayor of Temple Terrace, Frank Chillura, and the Mayor of Plant City, Rick Lott, were particularly interested in ways to continue to educate citizens in the community and joined the group in asking Dr. Novak specific questions about the species and how to control the spread of the virus.

Dr. Novak educated the panel about the specifics of the Aedes aegypti mosquitoes and answered questions about what makes this type of mosquito unique

Douglas Holt, MD, director of the Florida Department of Health and professor of medicine at the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine, shared efforts and strategies on behalf of the state. Dr. Holt spoke about Zika transmission rates, current cases in the state and the length of time that the Zika virus is active in the human body. “It’s generally active for up to 14 days,” Dr. Holt said. He pointed out that little is known about the actual facts in Zika virus transmission and a tremendous amount still needs to be learned.

“We’re learning the facts as we go,” he said. State funding for research and mosquito abatement is consistently changing, with additional funds being allocated per county to aid the control efforts.

Douglas Holt, MD, director of the Florida Department of Health, shared information about the current status of the Zika virus in Hillsborough and Pinellas counties and what is being done to track and test for the virus.

A combined effort with Hillsborough County Public Works and all municipalities is ongoing, to educate the public about this disease-carrying mosquito, that according to Novak and Hillsborough Public Works Department Director John Lyons, has been a topic of public outreach since the 1940s. He shared a 1945 archival film clip created in Tampa, pointing out that these mosquitos have been a nuisance in the area for more than 70 years. Lyons explained the tracking, treatment and spraying methods that the county currently uses and focused on community involvement, imploring residents to check their own property for standing water. He further explained that spraying methods often do not reach the shady, covered areas that Aedes aegypti prefers for their breeding.

Along with public education campaigns, Lyons and University of South Florida researchers are working on a global information system, or GIS, that uses satellite imagery to identify certain “hot spots,” or areas that include discarded tires and collections of potential breeding areas. The message is strong and clear, “spill it.” The less standing water, the better the chance of keeping the Zika-carrying mosquito at bay.

In September, a “Partners in Zika Prevention” roundtable discussion drew dozens of Pinellas County residents and municipal partners to the Tarpon Springs campus of St. Petersburg College. Pinellas County Mosquito Control staff and area experts shared information about the Zika virus, as well as best practices for combating mosquito-borne illness and ongoing prevention efforts with municipal partners and residents.

The panel of experts for Pinellas County’s “Partners in Zika Prevention” roundtable discussion included Thomas Unnasch, PhD, chair and Distinguished University Health Professor in the USF Department of Global Health.

The Pinellas roundtable panel, moderated by Pinellas County Board of County Commissioners Chairman Charlie Justice, featured expertise from Thomas Unnasch, PhD, chair and Distinguished Health Professor at the Department of Global Health, USF College of Public Health, who shared insight on methods of Zika transmission by the Aedes agypti mosquito.

Also on the Pinellas panel was Ulyee Choe, MD, director of the Florida Department of Health in Pinellas County; John Bennett, assistant county administrator, Public Health, Safety and Welfare; and Brian Lawton, program coordinator, Pinellas County Mosquito Control.

The ongoing conversation on ways for residents to avoid Aedes agypti will continue until there is a clear sign that the Zika virus is no longer a threat to residents of the Bay area.

View mosquito prevention tips from Pinellas County here. For more information about Pinellas County Mosquito Control, visit www.pinellascounty.org/mosquito and in Hillsborough County visit www.HillsboroughCounty.org/Mosquito.

Additional tips for prevention include:

• Drain all standing water every 5 to 7 days
• Discard old tires and trash
• Empty and clean birdbaths and pet bowls
• Cover boats and vehicles with tarps so they do not collect water
• Maintain the chemistry balance in pools; empty plastic pools
• Repair leaky pipes
• Do not let water runoff collect in shady areas

Reposted from USF Health News.

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Research shows stressed-out birds more attractive to mosquitoes, raising fears birds exposed to stressors such as road noise, pesticides and light pollution, will be bitten more often and spread more West Nile virus.

When researchers from the University of South Florida (USF) and colleagues investigated how the stress hormone, corticosterone, affects how birds cope with West Nile virus, they found that birds with higher levels of stress hormone were twice as likely to be bitten by mosquitoes that transmit the virus. Their studies have implications for the transmission of other viruses such as Eastern Equine Encephalitis, and perhaps even Zika, both known to be carried by the kind of mosquitoes used in this study.

A paper describing their research was published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

“Few studies have considered how stress hormone effects on individuals might influence population dynamics,” said study lead author Dr. Stephanie Gervasi, who conducted the studies while carrying out her postdoctoral work at USF and is now at the Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia. “For vector-borne diseases such as West Nile virus, the presence of corticosterone could influence pathogen spread through effects on contact rates with the mosquitoes that transmit it. In addition, stress hormones have negative effects on animals including immunosuppression and increased susceptibility to infections, which is why we are now also studying how corticosterone affects the birds’ immune response to the virus.”

Zebra finches (Photo by Eric Younghans, USF Health Communications)

According to the researchers, mosquitoes use a variety of cues to locate a target, including carbon dioxide output, body size and temperature. They hypothesized that these signals coming from a bird could convey information about stress hormones making the birds more appealing targets for the insects.

With the effects of corticosterone on mosquito feeding choices unknown, in a series of studies the researchers experimentally manipulated songbird stress hormones levels. Then they examined mosquito feeding preferences, feeding success and productivity as well as the defensive behaviors of birds trying to avoid being bitten.

In several phases of the study, zebra finches were treated with a low or high level of corticosterone and their caged light environment was altered to simulate dusk as the birds were made available to mosquitoes for measured periods of time. Bird and mosquito behavior was observed via video and the mosquitoes were later examined to determine if they had fed on the birds. The researchers also investigated the timing of subsequent mosquito egg-laying after the insects fed on the birds.

“Mosquitoes seem to be able to ‘sniff out’ the stress hormone and key in on individual birds,” said the study’s principal investigator Dr. Lynn Martin, associate professor in the USF Department of Integrative Biology. “The birds injected with higher levels of the hormone were twice as likely to be bitten by mosquitoes, even those hormone-treated birds were much more defensive than untreated ones. Corticosterone treatment increased tail flicks, and head shakes, and other defensive behaviors, but the mosquitoes managed to breach those defenses and feed more on stress hormone-treated birds.”

The study’s broader ecological implications suggest that an elevated stress hormone concentration raises the level of host attractiveness, potentially affecting the transmission of mosquito-borne diseases in a number of ways.

The researchers found that birds with higher levels of stress hormone were twice as likely to be bitten by mosquitoes (pictured here) that transmit the West Nile virus. (Photo by Eric Younghans, USF Health Communications)

“Stress hormones also altered the relationship between the timing of laying and clutch size in mosquitoes,” said co-principal investigator Dr. Thomas Unnasch, chair and Distinguished USF Health Professor in the Department of Global Health, USF College of Public Health.

Co-principal investigator Thomas Unnasch, PhD (Photo by Eric Younghans, USF Health Communications)

Mosquitoes that fed on birds with high stress hormone levels tended to lay different sized clutches of eggs at different rates than mosquitoes fed on control birds. These effects of bird stress on mosquito reproduction suggest that mosquito-feeding choice might also affect disease cycles in nature by changing the number of newborn mosquitoes that could be infected later by stressed birds.

The researchers concluded that the corticosterone levels in their test birds were within the range of normal for birds in the wild when exposed to stressors in natural their environments, such as road noise, pesticides and light pollution.

Watch videoclip of zebra finches communicating with one another.

“Much more work is necessary to further understand on the interplay of host corticosterone, vector-feeding behavior, host defenses and mosquito productivity,” the researchers said.

This work was supported by a National Science Foundation grant (#1257773).

Reposted from USF Health News

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“My practice is global communicable disease research and epidemiology, my passion is doing whatever I can to improve the health of marginalized populations and make the world a more fair and equitable place,” USF College of Public Health Ryan Ortega said.

Ortega graduated from the COPH on May 6 with a master of science in public health degree in global communicable diseases.

Ryan Ortega, MSPH (Photo courtesy of Natalie Preston)

Before pursuing his MSPH degree, Ortega earned his bachelor’s degree in social work at USF and did field work for a few years before realizing that he wanted to do more with his career.

Ortega said that he has always wanted to help people on a larger scale but his job with social work was mostly working with individuals.

“I was feeling like I wasn’t being challenged enough and wanted more of an intellectual challenge, especially when I started thinking about my career in the long run.  I knew it was time for a change and the idea of research really started to intrigue me,” Ortega said. “The idea of exploring the unknown and being on the intellectual frontier of a field, that’s what I wanted for my career.”

While researching what programs would be able to help him bridge the gap from social work to science, Ortega discovered epidemiology and enrolled at the COPH. A year later he transferred over to the Department of Global Health.

“I entered the epidemiology program at COPH and loved it, and haven’t ceased to love it, but after my first year I transferred to global health because a couple of advisors there really took an interest in me and were willing to offer me the mentoring relationships that I was craving,” he said.

During his time as a student Ortega participated in many research projects. He was even awarded a scholarship to fund his research on whether vegetation type and density surrounding the locations of catch basins is a determinant of mosquito production.

While working on a grant studying tuberculosis with research assistant professor in Global Health, Dr. Benjamin Jacob, Ortega decided that he could make this his thesis. He wanted to investigate if there was an association between active TB incidence among migrant farm workers and their population size.

“It was awesome! I think the thing I loved most about it was the process of constructing, developing, and optimizing models to answer that question,” he said. “We found no relationship, but we did learn that while TB is a problem in these migrant farm worker communities, they are not a reservoir for infection to the boarder populations most likely because they are so isolated.”

Ortega felt lucky to have had such great mentors, advisors, and professors who really invest in their students’ skills, experiences, personal growth and development.

“I have had some pretty amazing and outstanding teachers. I’m really grateful for people such as Drs. Novak, Wu, Boaz, Jacob and many others,” he said. “It’s so obvious that they take a real interest in their students and put a real effort into crafting the curriculum, making it into something that is compelling and interesting. They provoke students to want to learn.”

Graduate student Ryan Ortega (left in photo) and fellow COPH student researchers presenting one of several posters in January 2015.  Second from right is Ortega’s advisor, Dr. Robert Novak. (Photo courtesy of Marissa Williams)

Ortega was also impressed with and inspired by his peers he has met over the years and the great relationships he has made.

“My first year here I pretty much lived inside the laboratory and graduate student lounge. The other students that were always there with me were incredibly driven and hardworking,” he said. “When you are surrounded by people like that, it motivates you in a certain way. It makes you want to learn and grow more as well.”

Ortega said that pursuing his degree at COPH changed him, “I graduated from my bachelor’s program not feeling like I knew a lot about what I had just studied. It wasn’t until I started my master’s degree that I found this new determination and drive to learn and grow as much as I could, and to really be good at something.”

One of Ortega’s favorite memories from his time as a student was being able to work with two of his best friends on the USF Health Healthcare Innovation Venture Competition. Participants had to create a new health technology that could improve people’s lives along with a potential business model for selling the technology.

Ryan Ortega, Michael Bair, and Robert Bair (not pictured), first place winners of the USF Health Healthcare Innovation Venture Competition (Photo courtesy of Ryan Ortega)

“We came up a solar-powered autoclave so that you can use it anywhere in the world as long as there was sunlight, particularly in places where access to electricity is often limited or unreliable. After creating a small prototype and working with a local businessman on our model we ended up winning first place!” he said.

After graduation, Ortega will be interning with the Polk County Mosquito Abatement District along with beginning his PhD at the USF COPH.

“I have a great relationship with the director of the abatement district. He has a lot of data at his disposal and many questions that he wants answered regarding mosquito populations and their relationship to public health,” he said. “I’ll be starting my PhD and want to figure out how to blend the two and how to use what I’m learning at my internship to benefit my education and vice versa.”

After he achieves his PhD, Ortega wants to apply and be a part of the Epidemic Intelligence Service with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“What I love about public health is that I can do research. There’s an intellectual challenge involved and ultimately it is something that you can use to help people and benefit society,” Ortega said.

Story by Caitlin Keough, USF College of Public Health

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USF-led study of Culex erraticus probes ecology of Eastern equine encephalitis virus, one of the most deadly mosquito-borne viruses, which can affect horses and, in rare cases, humans.

The mosquito species Culex erraticus may play a more significant role in transmitting the Eastern equine encephalitis virus (EEEV) in the southeastern United States than Culiseta melanura, the species most commonly associated with the potentially lethal virus, reports a study led by researchers at the University of South Florida (USF) Global Health Infectious Disease Program. The study was recently published online in the Journal of Medical Entomology.

EEEV, transmitted through the bite of an infected mosquito, can be passed to a wide range of animals including birds, reptiles, amphibians and mammals. But once infected, horses and humans appear to suffer the most adverse affects.

The mosquito Culex erraticus — Photo courtesy of Nathan Burkett-Cadena, PhD, University of Florida IFAS, Florida Medical Entomology Laboratory.

The researchers combined data from field and laboratory studies in Florida with that collected earlier at Tuskegee National Forest in Alabama, where Cx. erraticus is common and Cs. melanura relatively rare. Their collective analysis indicated that Cx erraticus was about half as important as Cs. melanura in transmitting the virus in foci in the southeastern United States.

Despite its inefficiency in transmitting EEEV in a laboratory setting, Cx. erraticus is much more abundant in the southeastern United States than Cs. melanura. The species also feeds on a wider variety of animals than Cs. melanura, which feeds almost exclusively on songbirds for its blood meals.

“Taken together, our latest data suggests we have identified a mosquito species that is an important vector for Eastern equine encephalitis virus in the southeastern United States,” said the study’s principal investigator Thomas Unnasch, PhD, distinguished health professor and chair of the Department of Global Health, USF College of Public Health.

Thomas Unnasch, PhD, of the USF Global Health Infectious Disease program, was lead investigator for the study.

The favorite avian hosts of Cx. erraticus are wading birds, such as the herons. “We hypothesize that Florida may serve as the reservoir for periodically reintroducing EEEV to the rest of the United States,” Dr. Unnasch said. “This species of mosquito may be capable of amplifying the virus in nesting herons and bridging the infection from the birds to uninfected horses and humans.”

Read the full story from at USF Health News

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“Health is one of the major components in the vicious cycle of poverty,” said Emily Lupton, a research assistant at the University of South Florida’s College of Public Health who recently authored her first publication in Parasitology International.

Originally from North Carolina, Lupton earned her Master of Public Health in epidemiology and global communicable diseases from USF in 2014 and has been working as a full-time research assistant to help the fight against malaria ever since.

Emily Lupton visits a temple by the waterside in Bali, Indonesia, in 2014.

Lupton’s interest in public health stemmed from her volunteer experience during the summers of 2011 and 2012 at a health clinic in Uganda, where she learned that many of the health problems the community faced could be addressed at the population level.

During her stay in Uganda, Lupton witnessed terrible conditions and saw the disease change the lives of 90 percent of the patients at the clinic.  One patient in particular, a 3-year-old girl named Joanna, developed a severe case of malaria and died soon after Lupton returned to the United States to start her MPH program at USF.  The death of the little girl ignited Lupton’s passion against malaria, and she began looking for a way to contribute to the fight in Tampa.

Joanna, a 3-year-old Ugandan girl who passed away from severe Malaria in 2012 (Photo credit: Katie Rodriguez USF MCOM MS3)

Lupton and Joanna in Uganda, 2012

“I had no idea I would find someone at USF doing malaria research,” Lupton said on finding a malaria research page on the USF web site.

Lupton compensated for her lack of laboratory experience with her passion and promise to learn quickly and work hard, and Dr. John Adams, her mentor, agreed to take her on as a volunteer in his research.  This volunteer position quickly turned into a part-time job and then a graduate assistantship.

Lupton dissecting malaria parasites from mosquito salivary glands in Mae Sot, Thailand, 2014

When she graduated in 2014, Lupton was hired full-time as a research assistant studying how to cryopreserve and enhance the longevity of parasites and how to isolate the malaria parasite from the mosquito salivary glands, among other things.

Lupton said her time at COPH was “filled with interesting classes, personal growth and new experiences,” and it shows in the strides she’s made as a researcher since graduation.

Throughout her time in the lab, Lupton has had the opportunity to work with international collaborators in Thailand on four separate trips, the most recent of which was completed in May.  She has presented her research for program officers from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and at the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene annual conference, and most recently, she authored her first publication in Parasitology International on enhancing the longevity of certain parasites after dissection from mosquito salivary glands.

Lupton presenting at the ASTMH Conference, November 2014

“I’ve had a passion to work in underserved communities ever since I first traveled abroad,” Lupton said, and this passion is evident in the progress she’s made with her research.

When she’s not busy researching a cure for malaria, you can find her traveling or enjoying Ultimate Frisbee.

The view from a temple in Bangkok, Thailand, 2013

Lupton in Thailand, 2014

Story by Annamarie Koehler-Shepley, College of Public Health.

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USF College of Public Health graduate student Ryan Ortega, a candidate for the master of science in public health, has been awarded the Student Research Scholarship to fund his thesis project.

Ryan Ortega

Ortega, whose concentration is global communicable diseases, will be examining a number of structural and environmental factors in order to determine which contribute to more or less mosquito production in specific stormwater structures – namely, catch basins – in Polk County, Fla.  He will conduct the research under the supervision of his advisor, Dr. Robert Novak, a professor in the Department of Global Health who is a specialist in vector-borne diseases, infectious disease ecology and medical entomology.

Stormwater sewers are notorious prime habitats for mosquito species that are vectors of human disease, particularly Culex species, which are known to transmit West Nile virus.  Additionally, personnel with the local mosquito abatement district have observed Aedes mosquitoes in these habitats, and Aedes aegypti is known to transmit dengue, yellow fever and chikungunya, the latter of which is a problem in the Caribbean and of major concern for spreading into Florida.

“Specifically,” Ortega said, “I will examine whether vegetation type and density surrounding the locations of catch basins is a determinant of mosquito production in such habitats. Little field research has been done on the effect of vegetation on mosquito production in this context. I also plan to look at how elevation changes in the structural design of the stormwater systems encourages mosquito production.  The results of this investigation would assist targeted mosquito surveillance and control strategies and bolster future efforts related to vector-borne disease risk assessment in urbanized areas.”​

The purpose of the COPH Student Research Scholarship is to provide funding for degree-seeking COPH graduate students to carry out research for their special projects theses or dissertations. The award is administered by the College of Public Health Office of Research as a competitive internal award within the COPH. Students’ proposals are reviewed by a team of COPH faculty and staff with representation from each department.

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