International Collaboration

Institute of Biomedical Engineering

Max Planck

Temerty Faculty of Medicine

Electrical & Computer Engineering

Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering

Music

University Health Network

When Taufik Valiante was a child, his baseball coach’s son passed away from severe epilepsy.

“I think that left a pretty indelible mark on me,” says Valiante, a senior scientist at the Krembil Research Institute, University Health Network, and an associate professor of surgery in the University of Toronto’s Temerty Faculty of Medicine.

Eventually, that experience in his youth led a sensitive, guitar-playing boy who hated the sight of blood to become a patient advocate, neurosurgeon and researcher studying the relationship between music and epilepsy.

Taufik Valiante

Today, he’s researching the connection between music and epilepsy with amazing results. A few years ago, his research team at the Krembil Brain Institute published a study suggesting listening to a six-minute selection of Mozart’s K448, Sonata for Two Pianos in D major every day could reduce seizure frequency in people living with epilepsy by up to 35 per cent.

The research has since grown to examine thousands of compositions from various artists and cultures.

“We're starting to expand this out really broadly and I have some collaborators now at the Max Planck Institute in Germany,” says Valiante, an alumus of U of T’s Faculty of Arts & Science who earned his honours bachelor of science from University College in 1988 as well as a PhD in physiology in 1995 and his medical degree in 1997 from U of T.

“Music is a mathematical construct and we think there are specific patterns in certain types of music that cause the brain to be less likely to go into a seizure,” he says.

“Epilepsy has provided an incredible opportunity to study the brain and a lot of credit goes to the patients who are willing to participate in studies to help us understand these things.”

As Purple Day approaches on March 26 to raise epilepsy awareness, Valiante recalls a career that started with successfully lobbying for a provincial strategy to improve care and recognition for people living with epilepsy, one of the world’s most common but nevertheless stigmatized neurological disorders.

“In my house we were raised to be social activists,” he says. “For people living with epilepsy, raising awareness is really important because the more people around them understand, the better their quality of life. And as a patient, you should hear the same thing whether it’s Purple Day or visiting my office or on the internet because it reinforces the importance of managing epilepsy.

“People often talk about a cure – and we're all hoping and working for that – but in the absence of that, it’s about, ‘How do you manage it well?’ "

A neurosurgeon at Toronto Western Hospital, Valiante co-directs the Max Planck-University of Toronto Centre for Neural Science and Technology, and CRANIA (Centre for Advancing Neurotechnological Innovation to Application). At U of T, he holds cross-appointments to the Institute of Biomedical Engineering and the Edward S. Rogers Sr. department of electrical and computer engineering in the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering.

He says his mother taught her children to “be good at the things we enjoy,” which he took to heart. He often picks up his bass guitar to relax, recently sharing tracks in an audio collaboration with a long-time musician patient.

Valiante says he had an epiphany about the relationship between math, physics and the brain during a class at University College with former professor Jack Dainty – a nuclear physicist turned pioneering plant biophysicist.

“That was among my most formative periods in my life. It was my third year and I was taking his plant membrane physiology course and it blew my mind that he could show you something physically exists just by using math and physics,” he says.

“By fourth year, I had submitted a proposal on how to use math and physics to study the brain. I got an award for it and that money supported research during the summer after graduating with my bachelor of science.”

Valiante says he encourages every student to be open to exploring new subjects and interests without always focusing on how it fits their career plans.

“None of us are smart enough to know how what we do today is going to impact us in the future,” he says. “Don’t always expect something back except the experience itself. From a purely human point of view, the one behavior that can immediately increase positive emotion and happiness is giving.

“It benefits you as much as the people you help.”

Researchers identify how cells move faster through mucus than blood

geoff.vendeville — Mon, 25 Jul 2022 16:20:57 +0000

Researchers identify how cells move faster through mucus than blood

geoff.vendeville Mon, 07/25/2022 - 12:20

Cutline

A study co-authored by U of T researchers suggests some cells travel faster in thicker fluid by using “membrane ruffling to sense changes in extracellular fluid viscosity and to trigger adaptive responses.” (photo by Mohammed Haneefa Nizamudeen/iStock)

Josslyn Johnstone

Topic

Cell and Systems Biology

Some cells move faster in thicker fluid – think honey versus water, or mucus as opposed to blood – because their ruffled edges sense the viscosity of their environment and adapt to increase their speed.

That was one of the surprising findings in a new study published in Nature Physics by researchers from the University of Toronto, Johns Hopkins University and Vanderbilt University.

The researchers' combined results in cancer and fibroblast cells – the type that often creates scars in tissues – suggest that the viscosity of a cell’s surrounding environment is an important contributor to disease, and may help explain tumour progression, scarring in mucus-filled lungs affected by cystic fibrosis, and the wound-healing process.

3D render of a breast cancer cell increasing spread area upon the addition of viscous fluid. Colour-coded for height, where cooler colors are higher. Render was created from a confocal z-stack timelapse of an breast cancer cell transfected with eGFP-F-tractin. Viscous fluid was added at 3.22s. Video displayed at 25 fps

“This link between cell viscosity and attachment has never been demonstrated before,” says Sergey Plotnikov, assistant professor in the department of cell and systems biology in the Faculty of Arts & Science at the University of Toronto and a co-corresponding author of the study. “We found that the thicker the surrounding environment, the stronger the cells adhere to the substrate and the faster they move – much like walking on an icy surface with shoes that have spikes, versus shoes with no grip at all.”

Understanding why cells behave in this unexpected way is important because cancer tumours create a viscous environment, which means spreading cells can move into tumours faster than non-cancerous tissues.

Since the researchers observed that cancer cells speed up in a thickened environment, they concluded that the development of ruffled edges in cancer cells may contribute to cancer spreading to other areas of the body.

Targeting the spreading response in fibroblasts, on the other hand, may reduce tissue damage in the mucus-filled lungs affected by cystic fibrosis. Because ruffled fibroblasts move quickly, they are the first type of cells to move through the mucus to the wound, contributing to scarring rather than healing. These results also may imply that by changing the viscosity of the lung’s mucus, one can control the cell movement.

“By showing how cells respond to what’s around them, and by describing the physical properties of this area, we can learn what affects their behaviour and eventually how to influence it,” says Ernest Iu, a PhD student in the department of cell and systems biology and co-author of the study.

Plotnikov adds: “For example, perhaps if you put a liquid as thick as honey into a wound, the cells will move deeper and faster into it, thereby healing it more effectively.”

Sergey Plotnikov (photo by Diana Tyszko)

Plotnikov and Iu used advanced microscopy techniques to measure the traction that cells exert to move, and changes in structural molecules inside the cells. They compared cancer and fibroblast cells, which have ruffled edges, to cells with smooth edges. They determined that ruffled cell edges sense the thickened environment, triggering a response that allows the cell to pull through the resistance – the ruffles flatten down, spread out and latch on to the surrounding surface.

The experiment originated at Johns Hopkins, where researchers Yun Chen and Matthew Pittman were examining the movement of cancer cells. Chen is an assistant professor of mechanical engineering and lead author of the study, while Pittman is a PhD student and the first author.

Pittman created a viscous, mucus-like polymer solution, deposited it on different cell types and saw that cancer cells moved faster than non-cancerous cells when migrating through the thick liquid. To further probe this behaviour, Chen collaborated with U of T’s Plotnikov, who specializes in the push and pull of cell movement.

Plotnikov was amazed at the change in speed going into thick, mucus-like liquid. “Normally, we’re looking at slow, subtle changes under the microscope, but we could see the cells moving twice as fast in real time, and spreading to double their original size,” he says.

Ernest Iu

Typically, cell movement depends on myosin proteins, which help muscles contract. Plotnikov and Iu reasoned that stopping myosin would prevent cells from spreading. However, they were surprised when evidence showed the cells still sped up despite this action. They instead found that columns of the actin protein inside the cell, which contributes to muscle contraction, became more stable in response to the thick liquid, further pushing out the edge of the cell.

The teams are now investigating how to slow the movement of ruffled cells through thickened environments, which may open the door to new treatments for people affected by cancer and cystic fibrosis.

Funding for the research was provided by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Canadian Network for Research and Innovation in Machining Technology, Ontario Graduate Scholarship, U.S. Department of Health & Human Services and United States Department of Defense.

Highway death toll signs associated with more crashes, researchers find

geoff.vendeville — Fri, 22 Apr 2022 16:49:53 +0000

Highway death toll signs associated with more crashes, researchers find

geoff.vendeville Fri, 04/22/2022 - 12:49

Cutline

A recent study co-written by U of T's Jonathan Hall suggests that death toll messages on highways can have the opposite of their desired effect (photo courtesy of Jonathan Hall)

Munk School Staff

Topic

Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy

Economics

Faculty

Research

Electronic billboards displaying traffic fatalities to encourage safer driving may actually contribute to an increase in crashes, a recent study co-authored by the University of Toronto's Jonathan Hall suggests.

Jonathan Hall

Using years of highway data from Texas, Hall – an assistant professor in the department of economics in the Faculty of Arts & Science and the Munk School of Global Affairs & Public Policy – teamed up with Joshua Madsen, of the University of Minnesota, to test the effectiveness of this strategy to reduce accidents.

They found that a message advertising the number of traffic deaths was linked with a 4.5 per cent uptick in crashes over the next 10 kilometres. That’s an increase comparable to raising the speed limit by between roughly 5 and 8 kilometres per hour or reducing the number of highway troopers by 6 to 14 per cent.

“Our back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that fatality messages cause an additional 2,600 crashes and 16 fatalities per year in Texas alone, with a toal social cost of (US) $377 million per year,” the researchers said.

Extrapolating to a nationwide figure, the researchers say safety messaging causes an extra 17,000 crashes across the U.S. and 104 deaths per year, with a social cost of US$2.5 billion.

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Hall said he and Madsen were surprised by their findings. "We did not start this project thinking these signs hurt, we thought they helped," he told the paper. "I think a reasonable takeaway would be that state departments of transportation should test their messages and track which of these messages are too distracting and which are helpful."

The researchers suggest that efforts to reduce traffic fatalities by way of electronic messaging may be backfiring because they are temporarily distracting and lead drivers to make mistakes.

Hall and Madsen took their data from Texas because messages there were consistently displayed one week a month. They compared highway data from the time of the campaign, from 2012 to 2017, to the two years prior, comparing weekly differences within each month.

“The messages increased the number of multi-vehicle crashes, but not single-vehicle crashes,” Hall said. “This is in line with drivers with increased cognitive loads making smaller errors due to distraction, like drifting out of a lane, rather than driving off the road.”

Moreover, the researchers found that the effect is worse as the year progresses and the traffic fatality count displayed on message boards increases. The largest number of additional crashes was recorded in January, when the fatality number was the highest. Hall and Madsen suggest that more sobering, in-your-face messaging could be even more distracting and harmful.

“Driving on a busy highway [and] having to navigate lane changes is more cognitively demanding than driving down a straight stretch of empty highway,” said Madsen, who teaches at the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management. “People have limited attention. When a driver’s cognitive load is already maxed out, adding on an attention-grabbing, sobering reminder of highway deaths [can] become a dangerous distraction.”

But the researchers did find that the safety messages fulfilled their intended purpose when the number of displayed deaths was low and when the interventions occurred on less busy highways. Madsen says this may be because these messages were not as taxing on drivers' attention.

While safety campaigns vary from place to place, the researchers say authorities should consider other ways to promote road safety.

“One of the key takeaways from this research was that fatality message campaigns increase the number of crashes, so stopping these campaigns is a low-cost way to improve traffic safety,” Hall says.

“This study illustrates why it is so important to study the effects of ‘nudges’ and other behavioural interventions. Just because a policy is well-intentioned doesn’t mean that it will result in a good outcome.”

This research was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program.

Global research alliance between U of T and University of Melbourne to take ‘strong relationship to another level’

lanthierj — Thu, 28 Oct 2021 11:33:21 +0000

Global research alliance between U of T and University of Melbourne to take ‘strong relationship to another level’

lanthierj Thu, 10/28/2021 - 07:33

Cutline

The Global Research Alliance between U of T, left, and the University of Melbourne, right, will provide faculty and students at both institutions with new opportunities for collaboration (photos by Diana Tyszko and University of Melbourne)

Scott Anderson

Topic

Global Lens

University of Melbourne

Chemistry

Joseph Wong

A wide-ranging partnership between the University of Toronto and the University of Melbourne in Australia will give faculty and students at both institutions new opportunities to collaborate on – and generate insights into – areas of common scholarly interest, say leaders at the two universities.

The newly formed Global Research Alliance, developed over the past four years, will provide funding for faculty members at the two institutions to work on joint research projects, a collaborative academic program to train PhD students and “global classrooms,” which will enable undergraduate students in Toronto and coursework students in Melbourne to study and learn together both in person and virtually.

Joseph Wong

The partnership builds on existing research ties and student exchanges between the universities and promises to expand the scope and reach of scholarship, especially in areas such as Indigenous health and truth and reconciliation, where Indigenous scholars have already met and discussed opportunities.

“There’s a tremendous opportunity for our two institutions, as flagship universities of settler countries, to do some really great work,” says Joseph Wong, U of T’s vice-president, international.

University of Melbourne Pro Vice-Chancellor (International) Adrian Little says the similarities between the two universities make them natural partners: Both are large institutions covering many academic disciplines that have deep connections to a diverse, multicultural city.

“There were lots of seeds that were ripe to bloom; they just needed a bit of co-ordination and a push,” he says, noting that the new agreement will “take a very strong relationship to another level.”

Adrian Little

For U of T, the partnership brings greater access to faculty and students at one of the top universities in Australia. It also serves as a launchpad for making new connections in the Asia-Pacific region, further expanding its roster of collaborators.

“One of the really interesting conversations we’re having is about bringing in partners from east Asia,” says Wong. “By partnering with Melbourne, we’re starting to knit together a kind of global network of networks – and that’s very enticing.”

There will be advantages for individual researchers at each university, too, who will gain from wider exposure for their work, says Wong.

“[Journal] articles written by colleagues here and in Australia suddenly have two different markets,” he notes. “I think we’re going to see greater research output, more novel output and greater global impact.”

University of Melbourne Pro Vice-Chancellor (Graduate and International Research) Justin Zobel says “faculty at both institutions are keen to partner with each other. As the leading institutions in our regions, with deep and complementary strengths in areas of global importance, working together creates the opportunity to address challenges across all fields of research.”

The two universities issued a call for joint research proposals last year. Six of those received up to $30,000 each. The winning proposals spanned several disciplines, from sociology to geography to medicine. One of the projects, by Dwight Seferos, a professor in U of T’s department of chemistry in the Faculty of Arts & Science, and Wallace Wong, a senior chemistry lecturer at Melbourne, will look at the use of advanced materials for harvesting and storing energy in remote communities. Another project will investigate the social and ecological benefits of urban trees.

Justin Zobel

Common to all the funded projects, say Little and Wong, are a commitment to academic excellence and a clear articulation of how a Toronto-Melbourne collaboration adds value to the research. Projects that showed potential for growth – for example, if the researcher-to-researcher relationships be expanded to include graduate students – were more likely to be approved.

A second call for proposals was issued by the universities this past summer – this time targeting researchers early in their careers. Applications are open until Nov. 1.

On the teaching side of the partnership, Wong envisions more opportunities for students to travel abroad and, through a new “global classroom” project, engage virtually with their peers at the University of Melbourne. U of T faculty who are interested in developing a global classroom can apply for funding from the office of the vice-president, international, and each campus now has an experienced global classroom adviser to work with faculty members, Wong says.

“Our initial aim is to develop several dozen global classrooms. We hope departments will see their value and start building them into their regular course offerings.”

Little also sees advantages for faculty as well as students. “As an academic, the idea that I could get my counterpart in Toronto into an online classroom with my students to be exposed to knowledge and expertise that is complementary to my own is an exciting prospect,” he says.

Rounding out the elements of the partnership is a joint academic program that pairs, or clusters together, researchers to co-supervise PhD students. Last year, 12 projects from such disciplines as computer science, public health, sociology and engineering were selected for the program. The next round of 10 successful projects across a diverse range of fields has just been announced.

In addition to being an attractive opportunity for globally minded doctoral students, the program could help faculty members build new research relationships through a larger pool of PhD students. The program could lead to joint grant applications and, eventually, joint publications.

While the partnership serves as a platform for all academic divisions at each university, some departments have been identified as strong initial candidates because of previously established relationships or common scholarly interests. These include Indigenous studies and Indigenous health, social work, migration, medicine and public health.

For Little, who is a professor of political theory, the potential for advancing knowledge around Indigenous topics in the two countries is particularly appealing.

“It seems to me we’ve got an awful lot to learn from one another,” he says. “And it must begin from sharing Indigenous knowledge – not the elite, top-down form of knowledge, but by building connections with Indigenous communities in each of our places – so we can reckon with our past and do better in the future.”

Regardless of the academic discipline, though, Little says the two universities are interested in combining forces to generate research and learning with a global impact.

“By bringing together two of the world’s best universities, the capacity for genuine advances is greatly accentuated.”

U of T releases new guidelines for researchers engaging in international partnerships

Christopher.Sorensen — Thu, 21 Oct 2021 19:28:21 +0000

U of T releases new guidelines for researchers engaging in international partnerships

Christopher.Sorensen Thu, 10/21/2021 - 15:28

Cutline

In an increasingly interconnected world, the advantages of international collaboration far outweigh the possible drawbacks, says Alex Mihailidis, U of T’s associate vice-president, international partnerships (photo by Nick Iwanyshyn)

Geoffrey Vendeville

Topic

Global Lens

The University of Toronto has released new guidelines to help faculty assess international research partnerships for potential risks.

The resources are available through the international office’s website and outline principles to consider before collaborating with partners outside Canada.

In an increasingly interconnected world, the advantages of international collaboration far outweigh the possible drawbacks, says Alex Mihailidis, U of T’s associate vice-president, international partnerships.

The benefits include bringing diverse perspectives to research, combining datasets for greater insights and attracting additional research funding for faculty, as well as opportunities to translate research into practical applications and social impact. For students, international partnerships make possible exchanges, internships and employment opportunities following graduation.

However, U of T researchers must also exercise caution when working with partners in other countries, keeping in mind differences in laws and political climates.

Mihailidis says problems can arise due to geopolitical tensions, intellectual property rights or the security of data or team members while travelling abroad – and that U of T faculty who fill out a Research Partnership Security Information Document for International Partnerships can help the university prepare in case of a setback.

“This is a tool among many in our toolbox to ensure that partnerships will be effective and meaningful, and that they will help our faculty advance their goals while staying aligned with the university’s values,” Mihailidis says. “It is not intended to stop partnerships, or to deter faculty from developing international partners.”

Mihailidis recently spoke with U of T News about the new guidelines.

What prompted this update of university processes around international partnerships?

There are several factors. With the changing times and the changing geopolitical relations around the world, it’s important that our faculty members go into partnerships with their eyes wide open. So, we asked ourselves: What kind of resources can we put in place to educate our faculty members around the types of things they need to think about when they enter into any type of partnership? That’s where these information documents come in. Most of this information already exists in U of T policies and best practices. We’re not reinventing the wheel here.

That said, the federal and provincial governments are coming out with their own regulations, processes and checklist around research security. We want to make sure that our faculty members are well prepared to complete those checklists, and we can support them where needed, so there are no issues when they apply for government funding or initiate a new collaboration through a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU).

What types of international partnerships are becoming more common at U of T?

U of T faculty members have engaged in international partnerships for years. This is true in the STEM fields, including computer science, engineering and medicine – and also in the social sciences and humanities.

Part of the international office’s strategy is to support that partnership development and help it scale into larger initiatives where opportunities exists, developing institution-to-institution partnerships with other universities. For example, the university has very productive partnerships with the University of Manchester, University of Melbourne, and National University of Singapore.

We are also taking more of a 360-degree approach at the university in terms of corporate partnerships – so that we are inclusive of STEM, social sciences and humanities and other disciplines – to really demonstrate that we have talent and skills across the entire university that will benefit partner companies. These types of partnerships have led to important activities such as the Alliance for AI-Accelerated Materials Discovery (A3MD), which also include corporate partners such as LG and Total.

What are the benefits and risks of international partnerships?

First off, the benefits far outweigh the risks. Benefits include exposing faculty members to new areas of research and new collaborators. Collaborating with international partners means the impact of our work is felt around the world. Working with corporate partners also opens up a lot of channels to translate research into the real world, whether it’s turning technologies into actual products or shaping policies and procedures. There are also the obvious benefits of additional funding to support a faculty member’s research.

Partnerships help students and trainees as well. They increase opportunities for student mobility, create possibilities for exchanges and internships, and can even result in employment for our graduates.

In terms of potential risks, it’s really specific to the context of the partnership and partner. That’s one of the things we’re trying to get at with these new processes and new information sheets we’re asking our faculty members to consider and complete. The information sheets are meant to give researchers a sense of the potential risks. By filling out these documents, they will help us assist them if any problems arise.

How does U of T’s approach compare to others when it comes to identifying risks?

I can confidently say, based on consultations, that U of T is leading in this space by putting processes in place to proactively prepare our faculty members in anticipation of potential issues and of government-mandated checklists. One of the benefits we're seeing from this is that U of T is being looked at as a leader and is being asked to collaborate with and advise other institutions as well as the government.

Researchers discover geologic process 'tearing apart' plates of the Earth's crust

lanthierj — Thu, 13 May 2021 15:36:08 +0000

Researchers discover geologic process 'tearing apart' plates of the Earth's crust

lanthierj Thu, 05/13/2021 - 11:36

Cutline

In a finding that sheds new light on plate tectonics, researchers say the plates on which Earth’s oceans sit are being pulled apart by massive tectonic forces even as they drift about the globe (image by Naeblys via Shutterstock)

Sean Bettam

Topic

Earth Sciences

Geoscientists at the University of Toronto and Istanbul Technical University have discovered a process in plate tectonics that shows tremendous damage occurs to areas of Earth’s crust long before it should be geologically altered by known plate-boundary processes – a finding that sheds new light on the planet’s tectonic cycle.

Plate tectonics, an accepted theory for more than 60 years that explains the geologic processes occurring below the surface of Earth, holds that its outer shell is fragmented into continent-sized blocks of solid rock – called “plates” – that slide over Earth's mantle, the rocky inner layer above the planet’s core. As the plates drift around and collide with each other over million-years-long periods, they produce everything from volcanoes and earthquakes to mountain ranges and deep ocean trenches at the boundaries where the plates collide.

Now, using supercomputer modelling, the researchers show that the plates on which Earth’s oceans sit are being torn apart by massive tectonic forces even as they drift about the globe. The findings are reported in a study published in the journal Nature Geoscience.

“Our work discovers that a completely different part of the plate is being pulled apart because of the subduction process, and at a remarkably early phase of the tectonic cycle,” said Erkan Gün, a PhD candidate in the department of Earth sciences in the Faculty of Arts & Science who is lead author of the study.

Up to now, the focus has been on the geological deformation of drifting plates at their boundaries after they had reached a subduction zone – such as the Marianas Trench in the Pacific Ocean, where the massive Pacific Plate dives beneath the smaller Philippine Plate and is recycled into Earth’s mantle.

(Figure A) In the initial state, the microcontinent drifts towards the subduction zone. (Figure B) The microcontinent then extends during its journey to the subduction trench owing to the tensional force applied by the pull of the rock slab pull across the subduction zone. (Figure C) Finally, the microcontinent accretes to the overriding plate and resists subduction due to its low density, causing the down-going slab to break off (Image by Erkan Gün/U of T)

But the new research shows much earlier damage to the drifting plate further away from the boundaries of two colliding plates, focused around zones of microcontinents – continental crustal fragments that have broken off from main continental masses to form distinct islands often several hundred kilometers from their place of origin.

The researchers term the mechanism a “subduction pulley,” where the weight of the subducting portion that dives beneath another tectonic plate pulls on the drifting ocean plate and tears apart the weak microcontinent sections in an early phase of potentially significant damage.

“The damage occurs long before the microcontinent fragment reaches its fate to be consumed in a subduction zone at the boundaries of the colliding plates,” said Russell Pysklywec, professor and chair of the department of Earth sciences and a co-author of the study.

He said another way to look at it is to think of the drifting ocean plate as an airport baggage conveyor, with microcontinents like pieces of luggage travelling on the conveyor.

“The conveyor system itself is actually tearing apart the luggage as it travels around the carousel before the luggage even reaches its owner.”

The researchers arrived at the results following a mysterious observation of major extension of rocks in alpine regions in Italy and Turkey. The observations suggested that the tectonic plates that brought the rocks to their current location were already highly damaged prior to the collisional and mountain-building events that normally cause deformation.

“We devised and conducted computational Earth models to investigate a process to account for the observations,” said Gün. “It turned out that the temperature and pressure rock histories that we measured with the virtual Earth models match closely with the enigmatic rock evolution observed in Italy and Turkey.”

The findings refine some of the fundamental aspects of plate tectonics and call for a revised understanding of this fundamental theory in geoscience, the researchers say.

“Normally we assume – and teach – that the ocean plate conveyor is too strong to be damaged as it drifts around the globe, but we prove otherwise,” said Pysklywec.

The findings build on the legacy of J. Tuzo Wilson, also a U of T scientist, and a renowned figure in geosciences who pioneered the idea of plate tectonics in the 1960s.

The research was made possible with support from SciNet and Compute Canada, the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey.

Tiny, prehistoric sea worm Oesia built tube-like “houses” on ocean floor and sealed itself inside

krisha — Thu, 07 Jul 2016 13:26:58 +0000

Tiny, prehistoric sea worm Oesia built tube-like “houses” on ocean floor and sealed itself inside

krisha Thu, 07/07/2016 - 09:26

Cutline

Oesia disjuncta: the worm shaped animal would have lived inside a porous tube, and used its “U”shaped structure to attach itself in place within the tube. (Photo by Jean-Bernard Caron)

Tom Kirk

St. John's College

University of Cambridge

Author legacy

Tom Kirk, St. John's College, University of Cambridge

Topic

Global Lens

Subheadline

But do we have a common ancestor with this tiny, solitary builder?

They looked like fossils of seaweed – but experts now say they were homes made by a creature called Oesia, which lived an isolated existence inside them about 500 million years ago.

Researchers from Canada and the UK say the fossils – originally believed to have come from a type of seaweed called Margaretia – are the vestiges of tubular structures which protected these ancient worms. Long, perforated tubes, they likely looked like narrow chimneys reaching up from the sea bed. Gaps in the structures allowed the tiny worms to feed without leaving their one-room homes.

Experts from the Universities of Toronto, Cambridge and Montreal and the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto collaborated on the study, published in the journal BMC Biology.

A distant ancestor common to all deuterostomes, from sea worms to humans?

Part of its importance is that it confirms Oesia was a primitive specimen from a group of creatures called hemichordates. These belong to a bigger group called deuterostomes, of which vertebrates (including humans) form a separate branch.

By finding out more about these early creatures, researchers hope eventually to be able to identify and characterize a distant ancestor common to all deuterostomes, from sea worms to humans.

In particular, the research supports the increasingly common view that this ancestor was probably a “filter feeder”, which ate by sucking in water and straining out nutrients. Oesia was one such filter feeder, with gills down most of its body to expel water afterwards, and holes in the walls of its tubular home to let the water in and out.

“Clues about the anatomy and lifestyle of the last common ancestor we all share”

Karma Nanglu ( picured below) is a PhD candidate in the department of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Toronto and the study’s lead author.

“Hemichordates are central to our understanding of how deuterostomes evolved,” Nanglu said. “Through them, we can get clues about the anatomy and lifestyle of the last common ancestor that we all share, and this adds further evidence to the hypothesis that the ancestor was a filter-feeder like Oesia.”

(Above: Nanglu with fossils freshly excavated from the Marble Canyon quarry site for identification, recording, and shipping to the Royal Ontario Museum/ photo: Jean-Bernard Caron)

“Oesia fossils are pretty enigmatic”

Professor Simon Conway Morris, from St John’s College, University of Cambridge and a co-author, said, “Oesia fossils are pretty enigmatic — they are very rare and until now we could not prove which group they belonged to. Now we know that they were primitive hemichordates — perhaps the most primitive of all.”

The study was possible thanks to the discovery of a rich source of fossilized remains near Marble Canyon, in the Canadian Rockies (Kootenay National Park, B.C.). Parks Canada, which holds jurisdiction over this and other Burgess Shale sites, said, they were “thrilled” by the discovery and “eager to share this exciting new piece of the ever-unfolding Burgess Shale story with visitors”.

“Marble Canyon is one of the most recently discovered fossil localities in the Burgess Shale, a geological formation known for its exceptional quality of fossil preservation,” said co-author Jean-Bernard Caron, senior curator of invertebrate palaeontology at the Royal Ontario Museum and associate professor in U of T's departments of Earth sciences and ecology and evolutionary biology. Caron led the research team that discovered Marble Canyon in 2012.

“Oesia has been known from an older Burgess Shale site for over 100 years, but the specimens from Marble Canyon are far more abundant and better preserved, giving us unprecedented details of the animal’s internal anatomy.”

Specimens from Marble Canyon are far more abundant and better preserved

Marble Canyon is located 40 kilometres south of the original Burgess Shale fossil locality in Yoho National Park, British Columbia. Parks Canada, who protects and manages Burgess Shale sites located in Yoho and Kootenay national parks, celebrated the discovery as another chapter in the ever unfolding Burgess Shale story with their visitors.

The research establishes that Oesia was similar to modern acorn worms with a proboscis, a collar, and a long trunk. Co-author Christopher B. Cameron, associate professor at the Université de Montréal added that, “Acorn worms are notoriously sparse in the fossil record. Only a handful of fossil species having been described, making the recognition of such an ancient representative of the group particularly noteworthy.”

The average Oesia was about 53mm long and rarely more than 10mm wide. Unusually, these worms had U-shaped gills running down most the length of their bodies to enable filter feeding. Gill slits seem to be a characteristic common to all deuterostomes; even humans have slits in their necks at an early stage in their embryonic development, and this is seen as evidence that all deuterostomes are related to a distant, common ancestor.

Oesia must have lived in tubes

The researchers realised that Oesia must have lived in tubes because among the Marble Canyon finds there are dozens of examples where the fossil remains of the worm are found within those of Margaretia.

Since the 1920s, Margaretia has been classified as a type of algae, albeit one unlike any other known species from this period in prehistory. The direct association with Oesia explains why Margaretia looks so exotic: This was no seaweed, but rather a perforated tube-like structure that the worm inhabited.

“A solitary mode of life”

The study suggests that in some cases these structures exceeded 50cm in height and that they were typically at least twice the width of the worm, giving it plenty of room. The ends were sealed off, making life inside a rather lonely experience. “Only single worms are found within tubes, suggesting a solitary mode of life,” Nanglu added. “This gives Oesia an interesting mix of characteristics: it has the general appearance and solitary lifestyle of the modern acorn worms, but the tube dwelling lifestyle and posterior attachment structure shown by their closely related sister-group the pterobranchs.”

At some point, the fossil record suggests that acorn worms underwent a transition, leaving their tubes and instead opting for a life under the sea bed. The study argues that as evolution gathered pace and more predators appeared on the scene, digging into the sea floor may simply have been a safer option. Certainly, modern-day acorn worms have adopted this lifestyle; rather than filter feeding they live in the sediment and eat nutrients within it.

“In its own depressing way this is a story of Darwinian competition,” Conway Morris explained. “The levels of competition and predation increased, life sped up and got harder, and animals had to protect themselves more. One way of doing this was to abandon life filter feeding in a tube, and instead to dig into the sediment and eat mud. Once there, they found a new niche and were able to make a perfectly good life for themselves.”

The study, titled “Cambrian suspension-feeding tubicolous hemichordates”, is published today in the journal BMC Biology.

See Marianne Collins' drawing showing Oesia inside their tube shaped dwellings below.

Diabetes: U of T, Kaiser Permanente scientists discover better way to predict the disease in new mothers

krisha — Thu, 23 Jun 2016 15:53:20 +0000

Diabetes: U of T, Kaiser Permanente scientists discover better way to predict the disease in new mothers krisha Thu, 06/23/2016 - 11:53

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photo by Bri Stoterau via flickr

Heidi Singer

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Heidi Singer

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Pregnancy

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Highly accurate method is better than glucose tolerance test, researchers say

Researchers at the University of Toronto and Kaiser Permamente have discovered a simple, accurate new way to predict which women with gestational diabetes will develop type 2 diabetes after delivery.

The discovery would allow health care providers to identify women at greatest risk and help motivate women to make early lifestyle changes and follow other strategies that could prevent them from developing the disease later in life.

Gestational diabetes is defined as glucose intolerance that is first identified during pregnancy. It occurs in three to 13 per cent of all pregnant women, and increases a woman’s risk of developing type 2 diabetes by 20 to 50 per cent within five years after pregnancy.

The joint efforts of the University of Toronto’s Michael Wheeler, a professor in the department of physiology, and Erica Gunderson, senior research scientist with the Kaiser Permanente Northern California Division of Research, led to development of a technique called targeted metabolomics to better predict the development of type 2 diabetes in women with recent gestational diabetes.

Typically, diabetes is diagnosed by measuring blood sugar levels in the form of glucose, an important fuel used by cells in the body. The researchers identified several other metabolites that indicate early changes that signify future diabetes risk long before changes in glucose levels occur.

The team tested fasting blood samples collected from women with gestational diabetes within two months after delivery — predicting with 83 per cent accuracy which women would develop the disease later on. These results were significantly better at predicting the development of type 2 diabetes than conventional methods, a fasting blood test followed by the time-consuming and inconvenient oral glucose tolerance test.

“After delivering a baby, many women may find it very difficult to schedule two hours for another glucose test,” says Wheeler, who is also a senior scientist at the Toronto General Research Institute. “What if we could create a much more effective test that could be given to women while they’re still in the hospital? Once diabetes has developed, it’s very difficult to reverse.”

Innovations in teaching: Teresa Kramarz wants to bring the world to the classroom

lavende4 — Mon, 20 Jun 2016 14:32:31 +0000

Innovations in teaching: Teresa Kramarz wants to bring the world to the classroom lavende4 Mon, 06/20/2016 - 10:32

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Teresa Kramarz leading a Munk One class: it's important that students gain international experience, she says (Johnny Guatto photo)

Terry Lavender

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Terry Lavender

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Our Community

Instructional Technology