- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
That's Bruce Hammock, distinguished professor in the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology who holds a joint appointment with the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center.
In research published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the interdisciplinary team of scientists from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, UC Davis, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, and Harvard Medical School linked a newly discovered class of bacterial enzymes to battling cystic fibrosis.
In analyzing secretions drawn from the lungs of cystic fibrosis patients at the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh, the scientists discovered that the bacterium perpetuates inflammation by secreting an enzyme called Cif that sabotages the body's ability to make a key molecule called a "pro-resolving lipid mediator" and stop the inflammatory response it started.
The scientific discovery could lead to new therapies that would interrupt or correct the bacterial sabotage, Hammock and Bomberger said.
“This paper is the outcome of an exciting and interdisciplinary project,” said Hammock, who directs the UC Davis Superfund Program financed by the National Institutes of Health's National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIH-NIEHS). “It started several years ago with the NIEHS Superfund Program funding both a group at Dartmouth and at UC Davis. A very productive and exciting collaboration resulted in looking at how to mitigate the effects of environmental chemicals on human health. Our collaborative work led to this joint publication which yields exciting hope for cystic fibrosis patients.”
Co-authors of the newly published research include two UC Davis researchers from the Hammock lab, Christophe Morisseau and Jun Yang.
Meanwhile, Bomberger continues to work on the biology of the system while the Dartmouth and Davis groups have developed inhibitors of the action of CIF to stabilize pro-resolving mediators, reduce inflammation, and control periodic flare ups of bacterial infections.
"It will be key to devise a way to remove P. aeruginosa's ability to capitalize on the body's natural inflammatory response, without eliminating that response," said Bomberger. "Inflammation is happening for a reason—to clear infection. We just need it to temper the response when it is not effectively doing its job or is no longer needed."
“We think that this research will lead to a very positive outcome to improve the lives of cystic fibrosis patients,” Hammock said. Some 30,000 Americans have cystic fibrosis.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Well, at some dinners. In. Many. Parts. Of. The. World.
Distinguished professor Bruce Hammock of the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology and UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center just shared with us "Bugs: They're What's for Dinner!" (not the bugs, the news story).
The gist of the piece, appearing in a recent edition of the Chemical and Engineering News: Gladys O. Latunde-Dada of King's College, London, found that if you eat crickets, you'll get almost as much iron as eating a sirloin steak. She and her research team studied four common food insects: grasshoppers (Sphenarium purpurascens), crickets (Gryllus bimaculatus), mealworms (Tenebrio molitor), and buffalo worms (Alphitobius diaperinus), a type of beetle larvae. Of the four insects, crickets scored highest for the total iron content--a whopping 12.91 mg/100 g. just shy of beef sirloin's 15-47 mg/100g.
Yum? Double yum?
Hold on!
Crickets and grasshoppers also make for an award-winning cookie. Think "Chocolate Chirp Cookies," the top winner in the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology's holiday cookie contest. They were the work of graduate student Heather Baker, who studies malaria mosquitoes in the lab of molecular biologist Shirley Luckhart.
Oddly enough, no one attending the social mentioned anything about the iron content in the "Chocolate Chirp Cookie."
Or how delicious they were.
Baker's cookie, made with cricket flour and topped with a grasshopper, won the "Most Innovative" category. She received a chef's hat, a $25 gift certificate to UC Davis Stores, and "The Golden Teaspoon Award."
Baker said she based her entry on a Pioneer Woman recipe but added cricket flour instead of "regular" flour. The grasshoppers? "I ordered them through Amazon," she said.
Does she eat insects regularly? "I can't say I eat insects regularly, ha, ha, although I'm always down to try them as a novelty!" Baker said. Her favorite? "My favorite so far is chocolate-covered ants."
The eating of insects, entomophagy, common in many countries throughout the world, is gaining momentum in the United States. "I've seen a number of articles touting insects as the 'future of meat,' because they contain a lot of protein and amino acids and are a very sustainable food source," she said. "They require much less water and space than animal farms, and insect farming emits far fewer greenhouse gases. Unfortunately, companies offering insect-based products are still developing the infrastructure to raise human food grade insects on a large scale, so a lot of these foods are incredibly expensive. The cricket flour alone costs $40-plus per pound!"
Of the 20 entries at the entomology/nematology social, Baker's cookies were "on the judges' short list in every category" in addition to her winning "Most Innovative," said contest coordinator Guyla Yoak. Thus, the awarding of The Golden Teaspoons...
The judges--professor Diane Ullman, emeritus professor Hugh Dingle, faculty affiliate Steve Seybold and account manager Wayne Monteiro—awarded four other first-place prizes.
- Steve Nadler, professor and chair of the department, won “Best Taste Without Chocolate" with his “Citrus Cranberry Walnut Cookies.”
- Junior specialist Stacey Lee Rice, who studies bagrada bugs in the lab of Extension entomologist Larry Godfrey, won “Best Taste with Chocolate” for her “Chocolate Bug Bites.” (No bugs. No bagradas. Just chocolate.)
- Account manager Elvia Mayes' entry, “Merry Minnies” cookies, scored “Best Decorated."
- Graduate student/mosquito researcher Mimi Portilla of the lab of aquatic entomologist Sharon Lawler, won “Best Entry Name” for her “Cereally Oatrageous Oatmeal Cookies.”
Unfortunately, most of the "chocolate chirps" went uneaten.
That's not to say the scientists who study bugs don't like bugs. They do. They just don't eat them. Generally.
One noted exception: those pesky wax moth larvae in bee hives.
"Wax moth larvae, when fed honey and baby food are delicious!" Hammock declared. "They taste just like cream of wheat with honey on it."
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
That sign, “I am NOT afraid of spiders,” greeted Louisa Lo, executive administrative assistant for Bruce Hammock, distinguished professor of entomology, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, when she arrived to work a week ago at her office on the "garden level" of Briggs Hall.
Her recently retired colleague and good friend, Shirley Gee, principal investigator, lecturer, mentor and the longtime manager of the Hammock research lab, saw the sign in a local store and purchased it for her.
Halloween is gone, but the sign isn't, and the spiders may not be.
And, yes, despite the sign, she says she's still a “little” afraid of spiders. A touch of arachnophobia.
And why does she not like spiders? “Spiders are creepy!” she said, smiling. “Actually it's not only spiders I don't like, but almost all kind of bugs, especially those with multiple legs! THEY CRAWL ALL OVER THE PLACE! And ironically, I am working in the Entomology Department!”
She works for Bruce Hammock, who holds a joint appointment with the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center. Highly recognized by his peers for his research, inventions, teaching and mentoring, Hammock is a fellow of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Inventors. which honors academic invention and encourages translations of inventions to benefit society. His many programs keep her busy.
Louisa is known as a treasure in the office--multi-skilled, personable and always helpful. "Louisa never failed to ask if she could help me," Gee recalled. "I'm going to miss her as a colleague, but mostly as a friend!"
Said Hammock: "Louisa brightened the office since the day she arrived. She somehow accomplishes the hard work of keeping the lab running under an appearance of always being ready to help. She makes new people feel welcome and lets alumni know they are missed. She even reminds me what day it is and when it is time to go home."
Lo considers this her dream job. “I love meeting and working with people with different backgrounds!” The Hammock lab draws scientists from all over the world. The 29-member international Hammock lab currently includes 1 undergraduate student, 1 graduate student, 7 postdoctorates, 7 research scientists, 8 visiting scholars and 3 staff. They represent 13 countries, including the United States, Turkey, Germany, China, France, India, Japan, Ukraine, Korea, Hong Kong, Canada, Brazil and Sweden.
Lo, who joined the Hammock lab on Aug. 17, 2011, will soon be moving to Michigan where her husband, Kin Sing Stephen Lee, a postdoc in the Hammock lab, has accepted a junior faculty position in the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology, Michigan State University.
Is Lee afraid of spiders? "He better not be afraid of spiders," she said. "He is the one relocating them for me if any are in our house!"
Lo's last day is Dec. 16 at UC Davis. She already has a position awaiting her. “It will be a very similar position as what I am doing right now except it is in a department setting (Department of Family Medicine at Michigan State University) rather than working for a single unit,” Lo said. “I will be responsible of managing accounts, helping with grant proposals and providing administrative support to the department. “
Born and raised in Hong Kong, Louisa came to the United States in 2002 to attend college. She received a degree in advertising “so my first job was a copywriter in an advertising firm in Hong Kong. Then I moved back to United States when my husband was finishing up grad school.”
Then the couple moved to Davis in 2010. Louisa worked as a warehouse associate and an office manager in a clinic before accepting her current position with the Hammock lab.
She and her husband are enjoying life with their toddler son, Skyler, who is just learning to walk, run and ride a tricycle.
Odds are Skyler won't be wearing a Spiderman outfit any time soon.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Bruce Hammock, UC Davis distinguished professor of entomology who holds a joint appointment with the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center, is fond of saying that in his many talks.
"Science is full of surprises."
His research clearly shows that basic science can lead to surprising findings.
A recently published news story, "From Caterpillars to Kidney Disease: Surprise Discoveries in Basic Science," on the Medical College of Wisconsin website chronicles how Hammock's basic research on caterpillars--how caterpillars become butterflies--led to key discoveries about chronic pain, including diabetic pain.
As an aside, Hammock suggested to communication specialist Karri Stock that the story could include a photo of a caterpillar and a butterfly, and did I have one?
I did, thanks to the Gulf Fritillary (Agraulis vanillae) population explosion on our passionflower vine (Passiflora). A caterpillar was doing what caterpillars do. Then two butterflies came along and started doing what males and females do. The three-in-one photo illustrates the article, along with a photo of Hammock and collaborator John Imig, professor of pharmacology and toxicology at the Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee.
The gist of the news story is that Imig received a $2.3 million grant from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases "to investigate the development of a drug to treat type 2 diabetes and metabolic syndrome."
"But what we didn't tell you is that this translational grant is all thanks to some caterpillars in California and decades of research," Stock wrote. "It's a tale of pure curiosity with a great lesson for budding scientists and the public alike: You can't always predict where basic science discoveries will lead."
She related how, more than 40 years ago, a young entomologist in California named Bruce Hammock found a key enzyme (epoxide hydrolase or EH) in the metamorphosis of caterpillars into butterflies. "The enzyme degrades a caterpillar's juvenile hormone, allowing it to move from the larval stage into an adult insect. Early in his career, Dr. Hammock found that if he exploited this EH and prevented larvae from becoming adults, he had on his hands an effective genetically engineered insecticide."
Then came the basic science and fundamental questions that Hammock asked. "Does the enzyme occur in plants? Does it occur in mammals?"
"And it turns out that it does, particularly as soluble epoxide hydrolase (sEH) in mammals, including mice and humans, and its distribution suggested it was involved in regulatory biology," Stock wrote. She went on to detail the collaboration of Hammock and Imig. Read the entire MCW story here.
Hammock's work has drawn national and international attention. Groundbreaking neuropathic pain research emanating from the Hammock lab made Discover magazine's Top 100 Science Stories of 2015 ranking among the Top 15 in the medicine/genetics category.
The UC Davis research was singled out for its “Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress in the Peripheral Nervous System is a Significant Driver of Neuropathic Pain,” published in July 2015 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. (See UC Davis news story).
Highly honored by his peers, Hammock is a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, which honors academic invention and encourages translations of inventions to benefit society. He is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, a fellow of the Entomological Society of America, and the recipient of the Bernard B. Brodie Award in Drug Metabolism, sponsored by the America Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics. He directs the campuswide Superfund Research Program, National Institutes of Health Biotechnology Training Program, and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) Combined Analytical Laboratory.
A native of Little Rock, Ark., Bruce earned a bachelor's degree in entomology from Louisiana State University in 1969 and his doctorate in entomology/toxicology from UC Berkeley in 1973, and then accepted a Rockefeller Postdoctoral Fellowship at Northwestern University. Hammock served as a member of the UC Riverside faculty for six years before joining UC Davis in 1980. In addition to maintaining a vigorous research program, Hammock teaches, mentors students, works with visiting scholars and enjoys rock climbing and kayaking.
And if you get a chance to hear him speak about his research, he's likely to say: "Science is full of surprises."
Because it is.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Well, if you're Bruce Hammock, distinguished professor of entomology with a joint appointment with the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center, you annually host the Hammock Lab Water Balloon Battle on the Briggs Hall lawn.
He and research scientist Christophe Morisseau, coordinator of the event, are water warriors--the "Splash Brothers" counterpart to basketball superstars Steph Curry and Klay Thompson of the Golden State Warriors.
Their aim is as good the Curry/Thompson three-pointers.
Just call it 15 minutes of aim...and here's why.
Last Friday afternoon 40 participants, including professors, researchers, graduate students, staff, students and family members, tossed 3000 water balloons in 15 minutes on the thirsty lawn, as the temperature soared to 97 degrees. As the supply dwindled, they dumped the remaining water from the buckets on each other.
A highlight: “Splash Sister” Alifia Merchant of the Hammock lab, who just received her master's degree in agriculture and environmental chemistry, managed to sneak up on Hammock and drench him.
Hammock launched the annual event in 2003 as a form of camaraderie and as a means of rewarding the lab members for their hard work. The international Hammock lab includes 7 researchers, 9 postdoctorates, 3 graduate students, 10 visiting scholars, 3 staff and 1 undergrad. They represent Barbados, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Korea, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, United States, Ukraine and Uruguay. Among those participating was Aldrin Gomes, associate professor in the Department of Physiology and Membrane Biology, and his lab.
Hammock, a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors, directs the campuswide Superfund Research and Training Program, an interdisciplinary program funded by the National Institute of Environmental Sciences (NIEHS) that has brought in almost $60 million to the UC Davis campus. The Hammock lab is also the home of the National Institutes of Health Training Grant in Biomolecular Technology. The lab alumni, totaling more than 100 graduates, hold positions of distinction in academia, industry and government as well as more than 300 postdoctorates.
The “Balloon Battle at Briggs” was canceled last year due to the severity of the California drought. In 2014, the water warriors took drought-conservation precautions as they did this year.
“We devised a filling station out of drip line and valves so we could fill the balloons outside and also turn off the water when not in use,” said Hammock lab program manager Cindy McReynolds. “Water conservation was a big topic surrounding the (2014) event, so we also used it as an opportunity to discuss ways we have changed our daily routines to conserve water."
As an extra bonus, the annual battle provides a little water for the thirsty Briggs Hall lawn, which is used by campus wildlife, including ducks, turkeys, squirrels, birds, butterflies and bees.
(Editor's Note: Hammock, who received his doctorate in entomology at UC Berkeley in 1973, joined the UC Davis faculty in 1980. Although an entomologist, he is now involved more in human health--alleviating human pain--than he is with insect research. With Sarjeet Gill (now at UC Riverside) he discovered that the enzyme, soluble epoxide hydrolase (sEH), degrades fatty acid epoxides and plays an important role in human diseases. Hammock and his lab have developed inhibitors of sEH that are anti-inflammatory, anti-hypertensive, analgesic and organ-protective. Groundbreaking neuropathic pain research emanating from the Hammock lab made Discover magazine's Top 100 Science Stories of 2015 and ranks among the Top 15 in the Medicine/Genetics category. The UC Davis research was singled out for “Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress in the Peripheral Nervous System is a Significant Driver of Neuropathic Pain,” published in July 2015 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. (See UC Davis news story)