Inflammations are alike

What is a dentist from Toronto doing among microbiologists in Linköping?  The answer is that inflammation is similar whether it affects the mouth or gut.

“The principle is the same with periodontitis as with intestinal inflammation,” says Richard Ellen, Director for “Cell Signals”, a program for research training that extends across borders.
His own research deals with how bacteria colonize on tissue surfaces, especially on the gingiva (gums).  Almost 30 years ago, he got to know Karl-Eric Magnusson, now Professor of Medical Microbiology at Linköping University.  Their contact grew into a long-term research collaboration.  “Over these many years, I have stopped by in Linköping at different times, and “Kalle” [Karl-Eric] has likewise visited me at the University of Toronto, says Richard Ellen.

Around the year 2000, his career took a new direction at the same time as the Canadian government set a new course for medical research.  The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) was established and initiated, among other priorities, interdisciplinary “strategic training centers” for research trainees.  The direction drove toward more translational research with strong international ties.

Richard Ellen worked out a broad training proposal in inflammation and pain.  It was approved, and he could launch the program “Cell Signals” – officially, “Health Applications of Cell Signaling in Mucosal Inflammation & Pain”. 

“There have been 30-35 research trainees who have been connected with the program.  We provide them what they need in value-added knowledge: networking, grant writing, peer review, publishing, knowledge translation, and ethics.  The usual research training in their particular scientific field is provided through their home university department.”

The program has been renewed in 2009, with four international partners that focus on inflammation; Linköping University is the partner responsible for gastro-intestinal inflammation and immunity.

“The intention is to attract some of Linköping’s students to study in Canada and Canadians to study in Linköping.  Our research interests fall very close to one another.”

The other international partners are the University of Minnesota, the National Jewish Health Center in Denver, and the Center for Sensory-Motor Interaction in Ålborg, Denmark.

“We want our research trainees to be involved more in translational research (research (research that arises from patients’ health needs).  [As training exercises], we shall pose specific research questions that our trainees should solve, for example: Can we control inflammation so that it works for the patient [i.e., promotes healing] instead of against the patient?”

“More clinical and translational research is needed both in Sweden and in Canada, and we hope that some of our Ph.D. Trainees will become their generation’s leaders in this area,” says Richard Ellen.

Since participants in our program are found in several cities and countries, the intention is to do a good deal of networking via the web.

“We live in a shrinking world, and new researchers will work much more internationally.  This whole project grew because Karl-Eric [Magnusson] and I had had international contacts early in our careers, and our paths had crossed many times.”

Richard Ellen has done a lot of research on periodontitis, chronic inflammatory gum disease, which is caused partly by spirochetes – screw-shaped bacteria that thrive in gingival pockets.  They interact there with neutrophils, a type of white blood cell on the front line of inflammation.  The offshoot of disturbed balance between these battling bacteria and defensive cells can lead to exacerbated chronic inflammation.

An important factor in this drama is cell signaling.  Bacterial populations survive by exchanging chemical signals with each other, with the body’s immune cells, and cells that line our tissues.

“One of the best environments, anywhere, to study these events is at Linköping University in collaboration with Karl-Eric Magnusson, Olle Stendahl, Karin Fälth-Magnusson, and Johan Söderholm.  The principle is the same in periodontitis and colitis (inflammation of the intestine) and Crohn’s disease”, says Richard Ellen.

The researchers find many parallels between the various diseases where inflammation is the common denominator.  For example, inflammation also causes breakdown of bone.  Bone resorbs chronically in inflammatory periodontitis as it does in arthritis.  Another example is cardiovascular disease, where inflammation leads to the build-up of plaques in the arteries (atherosclerosis, “hardening of the arteries”).