Quarterly Newsletter of the Belgian Society for Microbiology Issue no.8, February 2014

Contents

Welcome by the president of BSM Page 1 Call for (renewal of) Membership Page 2 News from FEMS Page 2 Poster Awards – 2013 Meeting of the Belgian Society for Microbiology Page 3 Pictures from the joint BSM/BCCM Symposium Page 4 PhD Corner - Mariya Petrova Page 5 A polio vaccine for Belgium in 1956 Page 7 Report on a FEMS Research Fellowship – Veerle Liebens Page 12 International Tuberculosis Conference Page 13 Composition of the BSM board Page 15 Call for contributions Page 15

Welcome

Dear Microbiologist, This is the 8th issue of the Belgian Society for Microbiology (BSM) Newsletter, and the first of 2014. It gives me the opportunity to look back to the previous year, in which BSM has organized its annual meeting in Brussels. This event was jointly organized with the Belgian Co-ordinated Collections of Micro-organisms (BCCM) as a back-to-back meeting and can be considered a great success, both scientifically and in numbers. The organizing committee was again able to invite renowned foreign and Belgian speakers for the topic to give an overview on prokaryotic and viral diversity. It was well illustrated during the meeting that plasticity of the genomes of micro-organisms is at the basis of molecular evolution and of survival strategies of these living organisms. More than 200 persons attended one or both days, and circa 60 posters were presented. Six posters were awarded a poster prize (see results in this issue). A few photographs give you an impression of the meeting. We are now looking forward to the next meeting, which will be the 20th meeting, organized by the BSM, in collaboration with the National Committee for Microbiology. This meeting is planned on November 18th 2014 in Brussels (Academy Palace) with the topic “Microbial cell signaling”. The full program will become available in due time, but mark the date in your agenda! As we entered 2014, may I invite you to renew your membership, or join BSM. Please visit the BSM website (http://www.belsocmicrobio.be/BSM/Home.html) to see the details and to renew/join. Your membership offers you a number of advantages: being member of the microbiologically oriented scientific community, free entrance to the annual meeting with eminent speakers, poster presentation and poster awards, possible reduction of registration fee of BSM sponsored meetings, member of the Federation of European Microbiological Societies (FEMS) allowing to apply, e.g., for FEMS fellowships for short visits in a microbiology lab abroad (a report of such a stay can be found in this Newsletter). Finally, if members have new ideas on how they would like the Society to be improved, please contact me. Jozef Anné, BSM President

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Membership

Historically membership of BSM has been linked to the attendance of the yearly BSM symposium : the registration fee for the symposium was at the same time the membership or vice versa. For practical reasons, this has been uncoupled since 2011, and therefore we urge you to pay your membership fee as early as possible. Members paying before 15/07/2014 owe only € 25 and will get free access to the annual symposium and other events organized by BSM. They can also register at reduced rates for certain events co-sponsored by BSM. Later payments for symposium pre-registration or for membership will be €30. On-site registration fee will be €35. To renew your membership visit the BSM website www.belsocmicrobio.be

News from FEMS

FEMS is the Federation of European Microbiological Societies, and its main mission is to advance and unify microbiology knowledge. FEMS brings together 46 member societies from 36 European countries, covering over 30000 microbiologists. Belgium is represented in FEMS by BSM, and our FEMS delegate is Jozef Anné. When member for at least 2 years of a FEMS Member Society, you can apply for research fellowships, an advanced fellowship and/or support when organizing a meeting. These benefits are restricted to members of FEMS societies only. For more information, go to the FEMS website (http://www.fems-microbiology.org). Every other year FEMS organises the Congress of European Microbiologists – the 6th edition will be in Maastricht (NL) from 7 to 11 June 2015. More information can be found at http://www.fems-microbiology.org/congress/upcoming-fems-congress.html

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During the annual BSM meeting in Brussels on 26 and 27 November 2013, the following poster prizes were awarded : Belspo-BCCM award for the best poster of the BSM/BCCM meeting 2013 Bram Vekeman Exploring the diversity of methane-oxidizing bacteria in marine ecosystems Microbiology-Open award for the best bacteriology poster of the BSM/BCCM meeting 2013 Seyll Ethel Experimental evolution with a global regulator mutant in E. coli Microbiology-Open award for the best virology poster of the BSM/BCCM meeting 2013 Victor Van Puyenbroeck Development of new cyclotriazadisulfonamide (CADA) analogs that inhibit HIV replication by down-modulation of the CD4 receptor BSM Poster award of the BSM/BCCM meeting 2013 (bacteriology) B.S. Grama Carotenoids production in a Dactylococcus microalga from the Algerian Sahara BSM Poster award of the BSM/BCCM meeting 2013 (virology) Christophe Claessen pUL56-dependent downregulation of several cell surface markers in equine herpesvirus 1 (EHV1) infected equine mesenchymal stem cells ASM award of the BSM/BCCM meeting 2013 Kristine Stepanyan Endurance riddled with costs: persistence in Pseudomonas aeruginosa

Poster Awards – Meeting of the Belgian Society for Microbiology 26-27 November 2013

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Joint Meeting of the Belgian Society for Microbiology and BCCM 26-27 November 2013

Mariya Petrova (who has a Master’s degree in Microbiology, University of Sofia, Bulgaria) carried out her PhD studies in three different laboratories: the Centre of Microbial and Plant Genetics (KU Leuven), the new Laboratory of Applied Microbiology of the Dept. Bioscience Engineering (UAntwerpen) and the Laboratory of Virology and Chemotherapy (KU Leuven). Her promotors were prof. Jos Vanderleyden (KU Leuven), prof. Sarah Lebeer (UAntwerpen) and prof. Jan Balzarini (KU Leuven). Mariya was the first PhD student to investigate the tripartite relationship between microbicidal carbohydrate binding agents (CBAs), the beneficial vaginal microbiota and viral pathogens such as HIV. Her PhD work was part of the Program Financing (Centre of Excellence) on ‘Virus infections: molecular insights, targets for intervention and drug development’ led by Prof. J. Balzarini at KU Leuven. The microbiota present in the human body provide a vast number of health effects to the host. Already for decades, most attention is focused on the intestinal microbiota, while the vaginal microbiota is less well studied and understood. The vaginal microbiota is mainly dominated by Lactobacillus species, with a documented role in health. In her PhD research, Mariya therefore investigated specific molecular characteristics of vaginal lactobacilli, in general and in interaction with HIV.

PhD Corner - Mariya Petrova

In this section of the newsletter we will highlight the work of a recently graduated PhD student who obtained his or her degree at a Belgian university. In this edition we will focus on the work of Mariya Petrova who obtained a joint PhD degree in Bioscience Engineering at the University of Leuven and University of Antwerp on December 5th, 2013. If you are interested to have your work highlighted in the next issue of this newsletter, send a one-page summary of your work to BSM.newsletter@gmail.com

Molecular and Functional Analyses of Lectins

in Lactobacillus rhamnosus

To identify genetic mechanisms underlying adaptation to the vaginal niche, the well-documented urogenital probiotic strain Lactobacillus rhamnosus GR-1 was genotypically and phenotypically compared with the model gastrointestinal probiotic L. rhamnosus GG. This revealed novel insights in factors that are more relevant for vagina, such as resistance to high concentrations of oxidative stress, and utilization and degradation of keratin and heparin, while adhesion does not seemed as important as in the intestinal tract. In addition, Mariya studied the role of endogenous CBA lectins from L. rhamnosus GR-1 and L. rhamnosus GG. By the construction of dedicated mutants, she was able to show that lectin-like proteins from these probiotic strains are involved in adhesion of the strains to several epithelial cells. A possible role for Llp1 in tissue tropism of L. rhamnosus GR-1 towards vaginal epithelial cells, and not intestinal epithelial cells, was observed. In addition, she also investigated the interaction between her model probiotic strains and HIV. It was yet reported that specific Lactobacillus strains show activity against HIV, but the underlying molecular mechanisms were not yet explored. Preliminary data from this PhD work could show that lectins from L. rhamnosus species might play a role in the competitive binding of the virus, but this should be further investigated.

PhD Corner - Mariya Petrova

Molecular and Functional Analyses of Lectins in Lactobacillus rhamnosus

Finally, Mariya could show that the promising anti-HIV CBAs that are currently developed at REGA KU Leuven are not toxic against the beneficial vaginal Lactobacillus microbiota, which is crucial for their future applications as microbicide. Taken together, the findings from her PhD research revealed novel insights in molecular characteristics of vaginal Lactobacillus strains, which could help the design of more tailored applications of probiotic strains based on molecular knowledge.

Suggested references Petrova MI, van den Broek M, Balzarini J, Vanderleyden J, Lebeer S. (2013). Vaginal microbiota and its role in HIV transmission and infection. FEMS Microbiol Rev. 37: 762-792. Petrova MI, Mathys L, Lebeer S, Noppen S, Van Damme EJ, Tanaka H, Igarashi Y, Vaneechoutte M, Vanderleyden J, Balzarini J. (2013). Inhibition of infection and transmission of HIV-1 and lack of significant impact on the vaginal commensal lactobacilli by carbohydrate-binding agents. J Antimicrob Chemother. 68: 2026-2037.

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Poliomyelitis (infantile paralysis) was once a severe, worldwide health problem. Thanks to the ‘Global Polio Eradication Initiative’ of the WHO, occurrence of the virus is now limited to only three countries (Nigeria, Pakistan and Afghanistan), in which sustained generalized vaccination is hindered by all sorts of circumstances. Mistrust for the initiative with local populations is a major problem. Sometimes the circumstances are dramatic and do reach the general press; at other times setbacks receive little attention though they are not less important. In December 2012 Pakistan saw sixteen GPEI volunteer workers being assassinated in two waves of violence. Less dramatic but just as ill boding was the recent finding that the Pakistan strain of the virus appeared in sewage samples in Egypt, a country that had been free of virus since 2004 (http://scim.ag/polioEgypt). Time is long past that polio was a daily public news and concern in our country. Yet, this period is worthwhile to be remembered, not least because Belgian microbiologists were among the pioneers of the polio vaccine development. Poliomyelitis (infantile paralysis) was first described in the 19th century.

A Polio Vaccine for Belgium in 1956 Alfons Billiau, Rega Institute, University of Leuven

It was then occurring sporadically, but took epidemic proportions in industrialized countries during the first half of the 20th century. Infection with poliovirus mostly remains restricted to the intestine; spread of the virus to the motor neurons of the central nervous system occurs mainly in school-age children and young adults. In post world war II Belgium, successive peak incidences were noted in the late summer periods of 1945, 1952 and 1957 (Fig 1). Vaccination in our country was initiated in 1956. It was gradually intensified in 1957 and became government-supported from 1958 onward. Compulsory vaccination installed in 1967 and still in effect today, made that, as of the mid-1960s, our country became free of paralytic polio. The earliest vaccine used was the formaline-inactivated trivalent vaccine developed by Jonas Salk (Pittsburgh, U.S.A.). Its effectiveness had been demonstrated in 1954 by controlled trials in the U.S., Canada and Finland. This was followed by commercialization in the U.S. and by generalized vaccination campaigns, leading to dramatic reduction in disease incidence.

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Fig. 1.- Number of cases of paralytic polio in Belgium between 1940 and 1962.

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Initially, Europeans could purchase the Salk vaccine from U.S. companies, albeit at high cost and in limited quantities. Therefore (and for other reasons), local production units were set up in several European countries, mostly by state-directed laboratories. As a result, as of 1955-56, some of these countries gradually became more or less independent from oversees supplies. The story of early polio vaccination in Belgium is worthwhile to be remembered, as our country was among the first, if not the first, in Europe to become completely self-supporting in providing the vaccine for its population. The story starts in 1954 with the erection of a new medical research building at the University of Leuven, the Rega Institute, in which Professor Piet De Somer, the later rector of the university, installed a brand-new laboratory for research on viruses. In a way this was also the beginning of modern virology in Belgium. At the time, the viral nature of poliomyelitis was well established. However, virology as a discipline and a technology was still in its infancy. Producing a vaccine required multiplying the virus to high titers. In the late 1930s, Salk had produced an influenza vaccine, for which he had been able to multiply the virus by inoculating embryonated chicken eggs. But to replicate poliovirus, one needed mass cell culture of human or primate cells. Today, cell culture is made easy by the commercial availability of pre-tested media, sera and growth factors. Not so in the 1940s and 1950s: culture media had to be ‘home’-prepared using individual components, each of which more often than not contained trace impurities detrimental to cultured cells. Likewise, growth-promoting serum needed to be obtained by centrifugation of blood, collected from horses or calves in local slaughterhouses, relying on inappropriately trained personnel not even accustomed to aseptic technique. In 1954-55, De Somer, chose production of a Salk polio vaccine as a test case to jump-start virology as a discipline at Leuven university. Several European laboratories were already involved in a similar effort. Amongst them were Sven Gard in Sweden (Karoliska Institute, Stockholm), Herdis von Magnus in Denmark (Statens Serum Institut, Copenhagen) and Pierre Lépine in France (Institut Pasteur, Paris). Their virology labs were considered to be well established.

Also, the British pharmaceutical company Glaxo had initiated a virology laboratory in 1953 with the purpose to produce a Salk vaccine. Each of these had therefore taken a head-start on De Somer. Of note, other Belgian microbiology laboratories were likewise gearing up to add virology to their armamentarium: Lise Thiry (Institut Pasteur, Brussels), Emile Nihoul (Gent University), Paul Osterrieth (University of Liège). De Somer had one big advantage on his competitors: he had 100 % carte blanche from the pharmaceutical company, R.I.T. (Recherches et Industries Thérapeutiques, Genval) that he had helped to establish in the late 1940s and that, under his scientific leadership, had been successful in the production and commercialization of antibiotics. As early as 1949, De Somer and the company’s director, Jacques Lannoye, had entertained the idea to establish a microbiological research laboratory in the Leuven area, so as to facilitate access to diverse academic knowledge and know-how. It so happened that the Leuven Medical Faculty, coping with a growing number of young physician-researchers, had plans (but no money) to erect a new interdisciplinary research building. An agreement was reached (1950 or 1951) whereby the university would purchase the building lot and the company would provide the premises, with the proviso that the larger part of them would be occupied by the company’s research laboratories. The name ‘Rega Institute’ would be given to the building as a whole. Construction started in 1953, but only late 1955 was the building ready for being occupied. De Somer’s facilities consisted of approximately 750 m² net lab space, divided in three sections. Two of these were essentially directed at discovery of new antibiotics and comprised ‘bacteriology/mycology’ and ‘medicinal chemistry’, both of which had been in operation for several years while being housed in old buildings. The third section was slated to become the flagship of the new facility: a state-of-the-art laboratory for virus research. It comprised two units for virus propagation, each with air-controlled cabinets for cell culture, and two units for biochemistry research (protein and nucleic acids). Showpieces of lab equipment (now totally unimpressive) were: a giant -20 °C deep-freezer, an even more gigantic -70 °C freezer, a large refrigerated centrifuge, incubators in oak and mahogany wood and inverted microscopes.

Furthermore: two autoclaves and several stoves for dry sterilization. Quite some equipment items that were not commercially available were custom made by local companies, e.g. stainless-steel vats (ca. 15 liters) for preparation and filtration of media, serum and vaccine batches. Even more important than collecting all the hardware for the enterprise was the acquisition of hands-on technology of medium preparation, cell culture, virus propagation, inactivation and filtration. Mid-1953, well ahead of moving into the new building, De Somer attracted a first ‘chief technician’ for the new enterprise. Her name was Miss Monique Lamy . She was to become the leader of the enterprise and she did live up to that assignment, while becoming no less than a legendary figure. While waiting for the building to be ready, she spent several weeks in Lépine’s laboratory in the Institut Pasteur in Paris and in von Magnus’s laboratory in Copenhagen, all the while reporting to De Somer and taking care of ordering the appropriate glass ware and other small equipment. In october 1955 De Somer attracted a collaborator with academic stature: Dr. Abel Prinzie . He was to become the supervisor of the operation, and likewise did duly live up to that assignment. Additional personnel, 4 or 5 technicians in total, were recruited, mainly women students who had discontinued their preclinical curriculum at the medical faculty. The final decision to venture on production of a Salk vaccine was taken by the ‘Conseil d’Administration’ of the R.I.T. Company in April or May 1955; an operational budget of 1.000.000,- BEF for a period of one year was approved. The first cell cultures from monkey kidneys were established in November 1955, and strains of virulent poliovirus (Types I, II and III) arrived in Leuven in December. Establishing a routine of cell culturing and virus propagation must have been fraught with technical difficulties. While such problems are not documented other than by oral testimonies, problems with inactivation and filtration of the virus are amply documented by written correspondence between De Somer and Jonas Salk. As early as March 1955 De Somer wrote to Salk about loss in virus titer during filtration prior to formolization. Salk acknowledged having similar problems but disagreed with De Somer on the underlying mechanism. In a letter of may 18th 1955 De Somer announced that he had solved the problem by simply adding a small amount of surfactant before filtration.

However, more importantly, in the same letter he stated that a first batch of vaccine was ready for a trial. From other correspondence we can deduce that this batch was used to ‘vaccinate’ 24 adult volunteers. Thus, less than 5 months had elapsed between arrival of the first poliovirus strains in Leuven and experimental vaccination of volunteers. Only weeks later, the first children were vaccinated: De Somer’s own children and those of some colleagues. In 1956 two more batches of vaccine were prepared and used for further tests. By early summer 1956 about 100 children had been vaccinated, with blood samples taken before and after the injections for antibody determination. Unfortunately, this series came too late and was too small to impact on the epidemic of that year (Fig. 1). The whole enterprise was loosely supervised by a ‘Commission Interuniversitaire’ of which professors of pediatrics were members, and by the ‘State Institute for Hygiene and Epidemiology’. Safety and efficiency tests were done according to the ‘minimum requirements’ established by the U.S. regulatory authorities of the time. Amongst other tests this implied the injection of several monkeys. As of January 1957 the production was transferred to the R.I.T. factory in Rixensart. At this point in time De Somer was able to write to Salk that production was well standardized and running at 600.000 doses per month. In February 1957 De Somer’s collaborator, Prinzie, could report to the Institute of Hygiene on 650 and in April on 900 vaccinees. He also presented these results at a meeting of the WHO in Geneva, together with seroprevalence data on 2300 persons. Most of these data were obtained in the province of Limburg, thanks to the zeal of its Hygiene Inspector, Dr. Nestor Dufrane. In the course of 1957 the inspector pioneered generalized vaccination of children in his region. For this initiative R.I.T. donated 75.000 vaccine doses at no costs. Finally, in January 1958 the Minister of Health made vaccination of children between ages 6 months and 15 years free. Promotion campaigns were conducted on radio, TV and by other channels. By April 1958 the number of Belgian vaccinees amounted to 1.450.000. The protection level was established to be 92 to 97 %. All the while, other European countries had to a large extent been dependent on purchasing vaccine from companies in the U.S. and Canada, or had to delay vaccination campaigns.

However, as of 1958, the Belgian vaccine was gradually recognized to be equivalent despite being less expensive. In fact, after long negotiation, the Dutch government chose to purchase the Belgian vaccine for its national campaign in 1958/1959. Close collaboration and personal friendship between De Somer and the Director of the Dutch R.I.V. (Rijkinstituut voor de Volksgezondheid), Hans Cohen, made that the Netherlands would eventually succeed in building their own production unit. In fact, from De Somer’s correspondence it appears that workers in the R.I.V. established their first cultures for vaccine production in March 1958. Later, in the mid-sixties, this production unit would become famous for its advanced cell culture technology and for its highly potent Salk-type vaccine. Furthermore, in spite of their initial leeway in producing the vaccine, the Dutch health authorities were definitely more efficient in managing their vaccination campaign. Indeed the incidence of poliomyelitis decreased more swiftly in the Netherlands than in Belgium (Table 1). While in the late 1950s vaccination campaigns with Salk’s inactivated vaccine were going on, an orally administered a live attenuated vaccine was being developed in the U.S.by Albert Sabin. As of 1961, some countries, including Belgium, switched to this vaccine for generalized vaccination of children. One of the many reasons for this choice was that the viruses present in this vaccine replicate in the intestine of the vaccinees and are passed on to their contacts, thereby also reaching children who had not become duly vaccinated.

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Belgium 301 203 150 1,4

The Netherlands 25 84 36 0,3

W. Germany 4.161 4.667 309 0,5

U.S.A. 3.190 1312 909 0,5

Switzerland 139 152 12 0,2

Sweden 20 124 15 0,2

France 1.673 1.508 1.056 2,3

Italy n.d. n.d. 2.889 5,9

The Dutch authorities, in contrast to the Belgian ones, chose to continue using exclusively their very potent Salk-type vaccine. It so happened, however, that families belonging to certain religious communities in Holland, refused to submit their children to vaccination. The result was that the Netherlands remained confronted with minor epidemics of paralytic polio in these communities, whereas meanwhile the disease had completely disappeared in Belgium. Vaccination against polio became compulsory in Belgium in 1967. At that time the oral vaccine was generally used. However, in the late 1990s the oral vaccine came in disrepute because of increasing evidence that the attenuated viruses, by replicating in the intestines of vaccinees and contacts, can revert to virulence and provoke localized outbreaks of paralytic polio. Therefore, since the year 2000 the Salk-type vaccine is again in general use in our country. The vaccine is still produced at the same site where its production started in 1958, i.e. in Genval/Rixensart. Over the years, the site has expanded to become a world leader in production of vaccines and other biologicals; its current name is GlaxoSmithKline Biologicals.

Table 1. Number of paralytic poliomyelitis cases in European countries in the years following installment of vaccination (Data from: Courtois, G. et al. 1963 ).

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Some mile stones on the road to polio vaccination : - 1840: Jacob von Heine, a German orthopedic

surgeon, provides the first detailed description of infantile paralysis.

- 1844: Karl Oskar Medin, a Swedish pediatrician, describes a cluster of 44 cases. The disease becomes known as Heine-Medin disease.

- 1905: Ivar Wickman, Swedish pediatrician, studies an epidemic in Scandinavia, and postulates that a high proportion of infected individuals do not develop paralysis but show only generalized symptoms, such as fever. (The significance of this finding is recognized only much later.)

- 1908: Karl Landsteiner and Erwin Popper, Austrian microbiologists/immunologists, prove viral origin by showing transmission to monkeys with filterable patient material.

- 1920s and 1930s: virus propagation in brain tissue by in vivo transmission; unsuccessful attempts to produce an inactivated vaccine from infected brain tissue: accidents due to sensitization to brain antigens.

- 1931: Frank Burnet and Jean Macnamara demonstrate type diversity of poliovirus by studying cross-immunity in infected monkeys.

- 1941: Albert Sabin and Robert Ward demonstrate that, in patients, poliovirus replicates in alimentary tract tissue and in certain regions of the nervous system

- 1949: demonstration by John Enders, Thomas Weller and Frederick Robbins that poliovirus can be propagated in tissue or cells of other than neural origin

- 1950: Hilary Koprowki develops an experimental, orally administered, live attenuated vaccine produced on cotton rat brain tissue

- early 1950s: Jonas Salk and Julius Youngner establish a method for producing a formaline-inactivated vaccine from virus strains propagated on cell cultures of monkey kidneys.

- 1954: successful vaccination trial involving 650.000 children in the U.S., 25.000 in Canada and 20.000 in Finland, out of which 1/3 received a placebo.

-1955: official approval of the Salk vaccine for generalized use in the U.S. - Cutter incident: early batches of vaccine are associated with more than 200 cases of paralytic polio in vaccinated children or their contacts, leading to more rigorous methodology and monitoring of the inactivation process. - 1958: vaccination of children in Belgium receives

government support

- late 1950s: Albert Sabin finalizes development of an orally administered live polio vaccine based on attenuated strains. Many other countries, including Belgium, adopt this vaccine, alone or in combination with the inactivated one, for generalized vaccination.

- - 1967: compulsory vaccination in Belgium

- mid-1990s: increasing awareness that attenuated

polioviruses occasionally revert to virulence when replicating in vaccinees or their contacts.

- 2000: many countries, including Belgium, return to exclusive use of Salk-type vaccine.

Further reading: Billiau,A., Piet De Somer, het Leuvense Rega Instituut en het Belgisch poliovaccin in 1956-57. Verh.K.Acad.Geneesk.Belg. 2011. 73: 189-250. Eggers,H., History of poliomyelitis and poliomyelitis research. In Semler,B.L. and Wimmer,E. (Eds.) Molecular Biology of Picornaviruses. ASM Press, Washington 2002. Nathanson,N. and Fine,P., Poliomyelitis eradication: a dangerous endgame. Science 2002. 296: 269-270. Norrby,E., Polio and Nobel Prizes: looking back 50 years. Ann.Neurol. 2007. 61: 385-395.

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Meeting announcements

Meeting announcements – see also BSM blog for updates - http://belsocmicrobiolblog.wordpress.com/ 13

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Composition of the BSM Board

President & FEMS delegate : Jozef Anné (KU Leuven) Secretary & representative in the IUMS : Paul De Vos (UGent) Treasurer & liaison with NVVM : Tom Coenye (UGent) Members : Spiros Agathos (UCL), Abdelmounaaim Allaoui (ULB), Alfons Billiau (KU Leuven), Pierre Cornelis (VUB, liaison officer ASM), Paul Cos (UA), Herman Favoreel (UGent), Isabelle George (ULB), David Gillan (UMons), Laurent Gillet (ULg), Natalie Leys (SCK-CEN), Max Mergeay (SCK-CEN), Dominique Schols (KU Leuven), Jos Vanderleyden (KU Leuven) Contributed to this issue: Jozef Anné, Alfons Billiau, Tom Coenye, Veerle Liebens, Mariya Petrova, Dominique Schols

Call for contributions

With this quarterly newsletter the BSM board wants to improve its communication with BSM members and we hope to bring you useful microbiology-related information on a regular basis. Of course this is only possible with your contributions and we would like to invite you to submit these contributions to BSM.newsletter@gmail.com (preferably as a Word document). What can you submit ? Basically anything that is microbiology-related : vacancies in your lab, announcements of seminars, a summary of important/interesting research findings etc. If you want to discuss whether something would be suitable for inclusion in the newsletter prior to preparing the text, feel free to contact us as well.

VISIT US AT : http://www.belsocmicrobio.be/

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