. The Biological bulletin. Biology; Zoology; Biology; Marine Biology. R4 Annual Report Other Developments Last August, the MBL entered into an exciting collaborative research agreement with the pharmaceutical company Pfizer Inc. to study the potential of marine microorganisms to produce new chemical compounds for treating diseases. MBL Senior Scientist Norman Wainwright is leading this new effort at the MBL. Wainwright has been charged with providing Pfizer with compounds made by marine microbes gathered in local waters. Pfizer then tests these compounds against thousands of different screens
. The Biological bulletin. Biology; Zoology; Biology; Marine Biology. R4 Annual Report Other Developments Last August, the MBL entered into an exciting collaborative research agreement with the pharmaceutical company Pfizer Inc. to study the potential of marine microorganisms to produce new chemical compounds for treating diseases. MBL Senior Scientist Norman Wainwright is leading this new effort at the MBL. Wainwright has been charged with providing Pfizer with compounds made by marine microbes gathered in local waters. Pfizer then tests these compounds against thousands of different screens that detect antibiotic or anticancer activity. If Pfizer detects a novel compound, and if its antibiotic or anti-tumor activity is confirmed in subsequent tests, the compound may become one of the projects in Pfizer's drug development pipeline. In October 1995, Drs. Roxanna Smolowitz of the University of Pennsylvania's Laboratory for Aquatic Animal Medicine and Pathology based at the MBL and Dale Leavitt of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution identified a relatively new disease in hard clams, Mercenariu lucrccnaria. cultured in local clam leases. The disease is caused by an organism called QP.\ (Quahaug Parasite Unknown) and has only been identified twice previously in diseased clams in Canada. QPX is a protozoan parasite belonging to the phylum Labryinomorpha. It appears to invade the clam's mantle edges and gills causing debilitation and eventually death. The disease has made clam culturing uneconomical in Provincetown. Smolowitz and Leavitt are presently conducting research to monitor these and other clam flats, and to study QPX infectivity and transmission. Ultimately they hope to understand the pathogenesis of the disease and develop means of managing and preventing the disease. Associate Scientist Alan Kuzirian and colleagues have recently determined experimentally that lead in seawater can be toxic to the sea slug, Hennisscmln. Lead toxicity appears to inhibit norma
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Keywords: ., bookauthorlilliefrankrat, booksubjectbiology, booksubjectzoology
