NSI is a scientific association that arranges national and international meetings, organizes education seminars, workshops and public outreach programmes, as well as hosting social functions for its members. We are part of Scandinavian Society for Immunology.
The registration for the NSI annual meeting 2024, happening on November 29, is now open: https://nettskjema.no/a/440879. Also, please find below an overview of the NSI awards that you can apply for:
NSI – Bogen Young Investigator Award: A prize of NOK 50 000 for a young excellent researcher within the field of immunology. Please send nominations to Silke Appel (silke.appel@uib.no) before October 14, 2024.
NSI Publication Award: Given to the 1st author(s) of an outstanding original scientific paper in the field of immunology. Please send nominations to Gunnveig Grødeland (gunnveig.grodeland@medisin.uio.no) before October 14, 2024.
Per Brandtzæg’s Travel Grant: Travel grant to support international travel for postdoc in the field of immunology (mucosal immunology will be prioritized). Please send your application to Gunnveig Grødeland (gunnveig.grodeland@medisin.uio.no) before October 14, 2024.
NSI Travel grant: Please remember that persons from outside of Oslo who are presenting a poster or talk to the NSI Annual meeting on Nov 29 may apply for a travel grant.
In our next seminar from the NSI Rising Star Seminar series, we will be hosting Abigail Vanderheiden (Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, USA) with a talk on “ Investigating the contribution of the immune response to memory deficits after COVID-19 in mice”. Look forward to seeing you there!
Abstract: Millions of patients with post-acute symptoms of COVID-19 or ‘long-COVID’ are accumulating worldwide, however, the underlying mechanisms driving neurological dysfunction and how vaccination impacts risk are unknown. Current evidence suggests that SARS-CoV-2 does not cause widespread infection of the central nervous system (CNS). Despite this, post-mortem analyses of the hippocampi of COVID-19 patients have identified microglial activation, decreased neurogenesis, blood-brain barrier disruption, and pro-inflammatory cytokine production, including Interleukin-1b (IL-1b) a key component of the innate immune defense against viral infection. Here, we utilize a novel mouse model of the neurological effects of COVID-19 to investigate how innate immunity impacts memory deficits after SARS-CoV-2. We find that intranasal infection of C57BL/6J mice with the beta variant of SARS-CoV-2 (B.1.351) causes post-acute memory deficits as measured via the Novel Object recognition test that correlate with decreases in hippocampal neurogenesis and trisynaptic circuit synapse number. We find that SARS-CoV-2 infection prompts peripheral immune cell infiltration, persistent microglial activation, and elevated levels of IL-1b in the hippocampus. Mechanistically, we demonstrate that IL-1R1 signaling on neural stem cells promotes loss of hippocampal neurogenesis and subsequent memory deficits after SARS-CoV-2. Vaccination with a low dose of adenoviral vectored Spike protein prevents production of IL-1b in the hippocampus and subsequently protects against loss of neurogenesis and memory deficits after breakthrough SARS-CoV-2 infection. Combined, these data identify microglial production of IL-1b as one pathway driving memory deficits after COVID-19 that can be prevented by prior vaccination.
Bio: Dr. Vanderheiden is a post-doctoral research scholar in the laboratory of Dr. Michael Diamond at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. Dr. Vanderheiden performed her Ph.D. work in Immunology under the mentorship of Dr. Mehul Suthar at Emory University (Atlanta, GA, USA) where she investigated innate immune signaling in response to West Nile virus and SARS-CoV-2 and helped develop a novel mouse model of SARS-CoV-2 infection. She began her post-doctoral training under Dr. Robyn Klein at Washington University in St. Louis, where she used this mouse model to investigate how IL-1 signaling promotes memory deficits after COVID-19. In 2023, Dr. Klein left Washington University and Dr. Vanderheiden moved to the lab of Dr. Michael S. Diamond do continue her post-doctoral studies on how the immune response to SARS-CoV-2 infection impacts post-acute neurological dysfunction after COVID-19.
In our next seminar from the NSI Rising Star Seminar series, we will be hosting Camilla Engblom (Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden) with a talk on “Mapping B and T cell receptors in tissues using spatial transcriptomics”. Look forward to seeing you there!
Abstract: B and T cells perform functions critical to human health and they develop, differentiate, and expand in spatially distinct sites across the body. Both B and T cells express clonal heritable antigen receptors that confer exquisite molecular (i.e., antigen) specificity. Antigen receptors can be defined by sequencing, but these methods require tissue dissociation, which loses the anatomical location, and the surrounding functionally relevant environmental cues. Linking specific clonal sequences to their molecular and cellular surroundings, i.e., ‘clonal niche’, could help us understand and harness B and T cell activity. A technological bottleneck has been to capture the location of antigen receptor sequences, and by extension B and T cell clonal responses, directly within tissues. To address this, we recently developed a spatial transcriptomics-based approach (Spatial VDJ) and associated computational pipelines to reconstruct B and T cell clonality in human tissues. Using this technology, we spatially resolve B and T cell receptors within immune and tumor tissues, as well as B cell clonal evolution within germinal centers. Combined, Spatial VDJ links B and T cell clonal responses to their microenvironment with applications to various immune-related pathologies, including infections, cancer and autoimmune diseases.
Bio: Dr. Camilla Engblom is a SciLifeLab Fellow and a recently appointed Assistant Professor in the Division of Immunology and Allergy and the Department of Medicine, Solna at the Karolinska Institutet (KI). She received her PhD in Immunology from Harvard University in 2017 focusing on long-range cancer-host interactions involving myeloid cells (Mikael Pittet’s lab at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School). As a MSCA postdoctoral fellow in Jonas Frisén’s lab (KI) in a collaboration with Joakim Lundeberg’s lab, Dr. Engblom developed a spatial transcriptomics-based tool (Spatial VDJ) to map B cell and T cell receptors within human tissues. Located at SciLifeLab and the Center for Molecular Medicine (KI), the Engblom lab’s main research focus is to spatially and functionally resolve B cell clonal dynamics during cancer.
Key publications:
C. Engblom*/K. Thrane*/Q. Lin*, et al. Science. (2023).
Zilionis R*, Engblom C*, Pfirschke C*, Savova V*, et al. Immunity. 2019. May 21;50(5):1317-1334.
Engblom C*, Pfirschke C, et al. Science. 2017 Dec 1;358(6367).
Pfirschke C*, Engblom C*, et al. Immunity. 2016 Feb 16;44(2):343-54.
