The Earle W. Crampton Award is given in recognition of Distinguished Service in fields dealing with Nutrition and Food, and consists of an inscribed plaque and an honorarium. The recipient will deliver the Crampton Award Lecture on the Macdonald Campus during the spring semester of each academic year; the lecture is open to the public.
The Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences presents the award annually in recognition of merit in any academic, research, administrative or industry/community activities which result in significant progress in knowledge, and /or development of programmes and/or services that enhance nutrition and the quality of food for humans and/or animals. The Award is open to candidates in Canada or elsewhere in the world.
THE EW CRAMPTON AWARD AND LECTURE
FEBRUARY 20, 2014
Integrative biology of environmentally-induced autoimmune type 1 diabetes
Dr. Fraser W. Scott
Senior Scientist, the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute and Professor of Medicine and Biochemistry, University of Ottawa
2013-2014 Recipient
Dr. Fraser W. Scott
Senior Scientist, the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute
Professor of Medicine and Biochemistry, University of Ottawa
Dr. Scott received BSc and MSc degrees in Agricultural Chemistry from McGill and a PhD in Biochemistry from Queen’s University (Kingston) followed by postdoctoral training in cancer research at the University of Alberta. He then joined Health Canada as a Research Scientist. In 1999 he moved to the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute where he is a Senior Scientist in the Chronic Disease Program and Professor in the Departments of Medicine and Biochemistry, Microbiology and Immunology at the University of Ottawa. He has authored 128 scientific articles and presented more than 100 invited lectures.
The difficult job of the immune system is to find and kill invading pathogens without damaging normal tissue. However, in type 1 diabetes (T1D), the immune system mistakenly attacks and destroys the insulin-producing islet cells of the pancreas. Dr. Scott’s research aims to understand how environmental factors, particularly dietary antigens, control the expression of T1D in genetically at risk individuals.
His group was the first to report that diet could markedly affect the course and outcome of spontaneous autoimmune diabetes in BB rats, followed by characterization of the diabetes-inducing potential of all the major ingredients in standard, cereal-based diets. This led to the finding that wheat-proteins are potent dietary promoters of diabetes and the discovery of a diabetes-related wheat protein, now called Glo-3A, that is targeted by an abnormal immune reaction in diabetes-prone rats and a subset of patients. Early oral tolerizing with wheat antigens delayed and prevented diabetes in BBdp rats. Further studies demonstrated enteropathy and enhanced immune response to wheat proteins in BBdp rats. Similar findings were observed in T1D patients who displayed increased T cell proliferation and pro-inflammatory cytokine production in response to wheat peptides linked to a major diabetes risk gene. His group also discovered that the target tissue makes an early futile attempt to repair itself by increasing the production of specialized structures called tubular complexes and extra-islet insulin-containing structures that are centres of β-cell regeneration. Most recently, using germ-free BBdp rats, his group demonstrated that diet is the major influence on T1D in BBdp rats whereas microbes are secondary. This study also identified naturally occurring antimicrobial proteins and anti-inflammatory macrophages as potential protective factors in gut and pancreas of diabetes-prone rats. Using molecular and cellular approaches, Dr. Scott has developed a disease model that integrates the role of gut lumen antigens, the gut immune system and the endocrine pancreas in the development of diabetes.
Some of the Previous Recipents
2012-2013: Dr. Ronald O. Ball, University of Alberta
2011-2012: Dr. Mary L'Abbé, University of Toronto
2010-2011: Dr. Diane Finegood, Simon Fraser University
2009-2010: Dr. Ian Munro, Cantox Health Sciences International
2008-2009: Dr. Michael S. Kramer, McGill University
2007-2008: Dr. Tom Clandinin, University of Alberta
2006-2007: Dr. Steve Leeson, University of Guelph
2005-2006: Dr. Errol Marliss, McGill University
2004-2005: Dr. Claude Bouchard, Louisiana State University
2003-2004: Dr. Paul Pencharz, University of Toronto
2002-2003: Dr. John J. Kennelly,University of Alberta
2001-2002: Dr. Harriet V. Kuhnlein, McGill University
2000-2001: Dr. R.E. Smith, Nabisco Inc.
1999-2000: Dr. G. Harvey Anderson, University of Toronto
1997-1998: Dr. Stephanie Atkinson, McMaster University
1995-1996: Dr. Larry P. Milligan, University of Guelph
1993-1994: Dr. George Beaton, University of Toronto
1987: Dr. Khursheed N. Jeejeebhoy, University of Toronto
1986: Dr. Joyce Beare-Rogers, Bureau of Nutritional Sciences, Health & Welfare Canada
1985: Dr. Agnes Higgins (posthumously), Montreal Diet Dispensary
1984: Dr. Stanley J. Slinger, University of Guelph
1983: Dr. T. Keith Murray, Nutrition Bureau of Canada
1982: Dr. Eugene Donefer, McGill University
1981: Dr. Milton L. Scott, Cornell University
1976: Dr. Charles R. Scriver, McGill University, Montreal Children's Hospital
1975: Dr. Isabel Irwin (posthumously), USDA, Beltsville
1974: Dr. Zak Sabry, Nutrition Canada Survey
1973: Dr. Rachel Beaudoin, Université de Montréal