Fungal Research Trust activities

1
Fungal Research Trust activities

• Aim to Build a Centre of Excellence
• Direct research support
• Direct clinical fungal lab support
• Postgraduate training
• Support of Fungal conferences
• Travel Grants for conferences
• Aspergillus website sponsor

2
Direct Research Support

• 6 UK institutions Universities of Manchester,
  London (Imperial and Birbeck), Aberystwyth,
  Glasgow, and Kew Gardens
• European Society for Clinical Microbiology and
  Infectious Diseases and European Organisation for
  Research and Treatment of Cancer
• 1M spent over 12 years
• Major facilitating role
• - assisting UK survey of fungi (Kew Gardens),
• enabling genomic sequencing Aspergillus
  (Manchester)

3
Major discoveries

• gt80 research publications
• Tissue damaging enzymes from Aspergillus (1996)
• Resistance in Aspergillus (1997)
• Random method of knocking out genes in
  Aspergillus for new drug discovery (2001)
• Importance of fungal infection of diabetic feet
  (2001)
• Innate immune defect in normal people with
  chronic aspergillosis (2001)
• Increased disease in Candida with a gene
  knockout (2004)

4
Direct clinical fungal lab support

• Built and partially maintained a national
  service for antifungal testing since 1991
• Made a major contribution internationally to
  describing resistance tests
• Contributed directly to the European standard
  for resistance testing
• Determined the need for monitoring of antifungal
  levels of voriconazole and validated new
  testing procedures
• Contributed to training of Clinical Scientists

5
Postgraduate degrees

• 11 PhDs (3 more on the way)
• 4 MScs
• 2 MDs

6
Founded 1998, only website devoted to the disease
and organism causing it, comprehensive
7
Patients section of the Aspergillus website
8
Founded 1998, only website devoted to the disease
and organism causing it, comprehensive
9
Founded 1998, only website devoted to the disease
and organism causing it, comprehensive
10
Image section of the Aspergillus website
11
Aspergillus Website Statistics 2000-2004
160000
140000
120000
100000
Number of pages served per month .
80000
60000
40000
20000
0
Jan-00
Jul-00
Jan-01
Jul-01
Jan-02
Jul-02
Jan-03
Jul-03
Jan-04
12
Where do we want to go?

• Need for more primary research
• connection between fungi and Asthma is
  relatively poorly understood and appears rarely
  in the scientific literature
• risk factors
• Need more research into
• better diagnostic tools
• earlier and more accurate detection
• Research into aspergillus in children - a major
  killer in childhood leukemia
• Need to support young clinical scientists

13
Where do we want to go?

• All this needs dedication and vision and
• MONEY
• Fungal Research Trust spends lt 5 on
  overheads
• 12 current applications for 2.1M needing funding
• The Fungal Research Trust stepping up a gear