Mercado-Lubo profile
By RUDI HEMPE
CELS News Editor & Reporter
Chickens and salmonella-increasingly those two words seem to go together these days.
Salmonella outbreaks are being reported nationwide and even world wide as mass producing chicken farms are proliferating to meet the demand for chicken meat in human diets.
Salmonella enterica serovar Enteritidis has been called the single-most common cause of food poisoning in this country. The disease, which can go undetected can spread rapidly in chicken flocks and the rise of huge chicken producing farms, where thousands of chickens are concentrated in confined areas, are hotbeds for the spread of the disease.
Besides the health issue, salmonella poisoning is an economic one for those in the business and the US Department of Agriculture would love to see someone come up with a vaccine effective against Salmonella enterica serovar Enteritidis.
Some of the spade work toward that end is being done at URI by Regino
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Mercado-Lubo, a post-doc working for Dr. Paul Cohen of the Department of Cell and Molecular Biology (CMB) under a three-year program supported with earmark funds.
Mercado-Lubo has his M.D. from the University of Miami. A native of Columbia, South America, he says he was interested in taking more classes when an advisor suggested he explore research instead.
"I did clinical research as part of my training (for the M.D.) but not basic
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research," he says.
After talking with Dr. Jay Sperry, CMB chair, Mercado-Lubo became interested in Cohen's work on bacterial pathogens.
"It's been a great experience," he says.
Mercado-Lubo's work was to study the nutritional basis of Salmonella infection.
"On the basis of what he has done," says Cohen, "he has been able to come up with a vaccine strain that is avirulent in mice" but also protects mice from a virulent strain.
Mercado-Lubo's work was on the metabolism of sugars, explains Cohen. "Based on his work which was based on sugars, we think we may have a whole new way to combat infections with drugs," adds Cohen.
The project involves Intervet, the largest animal health company in the world and there is some collaboration with researchers working in Denmark, says Cohen.
The earmark funding for Mercado-Lubo is running out. He says he and his wife, who is expecting, hope to remain in this country-something that is difficult to do-and he says he hopes to land another post-doc appointment. "I want to continue with research," he says.
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