Unique tuberculosis vaccine offers prevention potential for world population

More than 100 faculty, staff, and students are researching tuberculosis at CSU, exploring new preventive vaccines and medical treatments.

Andrew Speaker, the tuberculosis patient who set off a firestorm recently when he flew the friendly skies, brought the issue of one of the world’s most deadly diseases into the public spotlight, just as Colorado State University researchers developed a novel vaccine to prevent TB.

The CSU-developed vaccine triggers the body's immunity by activating specific immune system functions that enhance the response to the bacterium that causes tuberculosis, say CSU researchers.

Although in preliminary stages of testing, the vaccine would likely be effective against all strains of tuberculosis, including multi-drug and extensively drug resistant tuberculosis.

Unique Potential
Preliminary evidence shows that the vaccine has promise of working after exposure to tuberculosis, which no other TB vaccine in current development has achieved. The vaccine is designed to be relatively easy to produce, unlike other vaccines under development.

"This novel vaccine system provides the template to design a series of new tuberculosis vaccines that could be very inexpensive to make," said Ian Orme, a CSU professor in the Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology Department and head of the research team that developed the vaccine." The next stage is to test the vaccine for long-lasting immunity and its ability to boost existing vaccines."

Human trials for the vaccine could occur in two to three years.

World-renowned research
Colorado State is one of the very few screening centers in the world searching for new drugs or vaccines that might be effective against tuberculosis, including strains that have developed resistance to current treatments.

The University, which currently houses more than 100 faculty, staff, and students researching tuberculosis, is a world leader in basic science leading to new preventive vaccines and medical treatments for the disease.

Lack of funding for higher ed could affect state’s potential

While Colorado State University this past year increased research funding, improved facilities, added faculty, and successfully launched its first Supercluster – a business model that transfers groundbreaking University innovation to the marketplace – the state’s budgetary outlook is dire news for Colorado’s institutions of higher education, said Colorado State University President Larry Edward Penley.

"A national study now places Colorado, among all 50 states, absolute last in our per-student support of young people in higher education," Penley said during a state-of-the-University speech in June. "It is time to recognize the solution does not exist in the current budgetary structure of our state."

Lack of funding affecting Colorado’s potential
Penley called for a voter-approved method that supports higher education through long-term, stable funding with a caveat that each institution be accountable for results. The grim alternatives are either more costly tuition or degradation of the quality of Colorado's higher-education system.

Higher education has a significant impact on Coloradans’ quality of life and the state’s economic future, explained Penley. Colorado's economy will be improved by an educated workforce, but a lack of funding is leading to erosion of Colorado's potential to be a leader in bioscience, high-tech jobs, and new innovations, he said.

Responding to environmental sustainability, global health
This past year, Colorado State worked to improve its responsibility to the environment, Penley said. The University established a sustainability committee to integrate the best methods of environmental stewardship into all campus operations. Most notably, Colorado State announced the purchase and creation of a wind farm that will make Colorado State the first fully wind-powered campus in the nation.

MicroRx, the University's first Supercluster, was launched in February to focus on finding solutions to global health problems. Penley said he hopes to see the second Supercluster launched this coming year.

Avoiding a defeatist attitude
Penley emphasized that, even with funding challenges, the University can't adopt a "poor me" attitude, but must instead take responsibility for its own future and success.

An example of this, he said, are the new facilities on the campus: the Academic Village, the University Center for the Arts, the federally funded Biocontainment Laboratory, and the Welcome Center for prospective students and their parents.

"Colorado State University, despite the budget difficulties, is in very good shape," Penley said.

Used tires in roadbeds combat expansive soils

CSU assistant professor Antonio Carraro leads an experiment to use Colorado's stockpiled rubber tires to improve roads.

Can some of Colorado's 40 million stockpiled rubber tires—the largest batch in the nation—be reused to bolster residential foundations and road bases to mitigate the effects of expansive soils?

Antonio Carraro, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at Colorado State University, thinks so.

Carraro is leading an experiment with the city of Loveland, Colo., to test a mixture of expansive soil and scrap tire rubber just below the pavement on a 200-foot, low-volume stretch of road near the I-25.

Environmentally friendly
With 40 million stockpiled tires, Colorado leads the nation in the number of scrap tires, according to the Rubber Manufacturers Association. New York ranks second with 37 million tires. The road test section in Loveland will use only about 20 percent rubber by weight when combined with soil.

"Only about 2 percent of scrap tire rubber products are reused in civil engineering applications in EPA Region VIII (which includes Colorado and five other western states), while other regions, such as the Midwestern United States, reuse more than 25 percent," Carraro said. "It's a major solid waste problem, particularly in the West where the population is spread out and there is less demand and no established civil engineering markets for reusing the tires."

"We're always looking for opportunities to improve our roads and do a better job with making our products more environmentally friendly," said Keith Reester, director of Public Works for the city of Loveland. "Hopefully we have a product that works that will allow us to take some of those tires out of the waste stream."

Beyond retreads
In Colorado, shredded tires are largely in demand for landfill construction, said Rick Welle, general manager of Front Range Tire Recycle in Sedalia. The tire shreds are also used as floor material for horse arenas and children's playgrounds, but tire recyclers are always looking for other markets.

The Loveland project is using about 25 tons of shredded tires equal to 2,225 passenger vehicle and light truck tires, said Welle.

"What we're hoping with this study is to show that tire shreds are beneficial for road base and that over time it will be a cost-effective product," Welle said. "It would be a huge market to really help Colorado get back with the rest of the country as far as managing scrap tires."

Researchers evaluate storm-water management in Denver, other U.S. cities

Colorado State University researchers are exploring ways for municipalities to protect urban waterways from pollution due to storm-water runoff—which can contain carry harmful pollutants such as automobile products or chemicals such as antibiotics into streams—in a first-of-its-kind study.

Municipal storm-water management agencies in Denver, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Philadelphia will participate in the study, which is intended to provide municipalities with effective tools for improving storm-water drainage.

Establish best management practices
The study will examine whether best management practices for storm-water pollutant control are directly linked to improved water quality in streams, said Larry Roesner, a CSU professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and director of the University’s Urban Water Center.

"This study will provide the foundation for making better, fact-based decisions on the types of best management practices that local governments use and approve within their jurisdictions," noted Ben Urbonas, manager of the Master Planning Program for the Urban Drainage and Flood Control District. The district covers 1,608 square miles and includes Denver, parts of the six surrounding counties, and all or parts of 33 incorporated cities and towns.

Treating runoff
Commonly used methods for treating runoff include settling and biofiltration that remove solids and associated pollutants from the runoff. Wetlands and created ponds are also used to remove pollutants plus nutrients that stimulate algae growth in urban waterways.

Colorado State engineers are leaders in the design of pragmatic computerized models that can help cities predict their success with these runoff-control measures.

Roughly half the streams in the country remain polluted as a result of storm runoff.

Health savings accounts grow in popularity

By Vickie Bajtelsmit

The fastest growing type of employer-sponsored health insurance is the high-deductible health plan combined with a health savings account.

There's no doubt about it. Health insurance is expensive and getting more so each year. Employers are passing more of the increasing costs on to employees, through increased deductibles, reduced benefits, or increased employee share of the premium cost.

The fastest growing type of employer-sponsored health insurance is the high-deductible health plan (HDHP) combined with a health savings account (HSA). By January 2007, 4.5 million people were covered by these plans, an increase of 40 percent over 2006, and employer surveys indicate that many more may be created in the future.

In fact, the U.S. Department of the Treasury predicts that 25 to 30 million people will be in these plans by 2010.

Gaining widespread acceptance
Why are consumer-driven health plans so popular?

The premium for a HDHP is cheaper than for other types of health insurance because you have to pay more out of pocket—the minimum deductibles are $1,100 for singles and $2,200 for family coverage. But by combining the health insurance with an HSA, you can set aside funds on a before-tax basis to help defray some of the out-of-pocket costs. Employers can make part or all of the HSA contribution and employees can also contribute.

Policymakers believe we will be more cost-conscious in health care decisions if our own money is at stake. If you have $2,200 in your HSA, for example, you can spend it on current health care, or if you can find some cheaper alternatives (for example, generic prescription drugs), you'll be able to keep the cost savings. If enough people buy into this, it could help to drive down health care spending, or at least slow the rate of growth.

Benefits of HSAs
An HSA is similar to a flexible spending arrangement (FSA) but has some significant differences. Funds held in an HSA are invested to earn investment income, and they can be carried over from year to year.

Two significant disadvantages of FSAs are that contributions earn no investment return and must be completely expended during the tax year. The carryover feature of HSAs allows currently healthy employees to fund future, more expensive health care needs.

The tax benefits of HSAs are also significant. The contributions are made before tax, just like traditional deductible IRAs. However, they are more similar to Roth IRAs in that withdrawals of both invested principal and investment returns are tax-free, if used for qualified medical expenditures and retirement.

Tax break
Until last year, the allowed annual contribution was only $1,000, just enough to cover the deductible, and not nearly enough to make them attractive alternatives to FSAs (which you can't have at the same time). Fortunately, the Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006 increased the annual contribution limits to $2,850 for self-only and $5,650 for family, with annual catch up contributions of $700 for policyholders age 55 and older (all scheduled to increase with inflation). With this change, it is reasonably possible to use an HSA to build up wealth, like an IRA. In 2006, HSA accounts totaled $5.1 billion.

High-deductible health plans with health savings accounts should be attractive to relatively healthy families, particularly those in higher tax brackets. The premium savings on the HDHP will allow you to apply household funds to other important financial goals, and the HSA will allow you to accumulate wealth in the most tax-efficient way.

Vickie Bajtelsmit is a professor of finance at Colorado State University’s College of Business.

Common good

"Higher education is not a private good driven by tuition paid by individual students and their parents. It is a common good that has considerable impact on our quality of life and economic prosperity."
—Larry Edward Penley, chancellor of Colorado State University, in a speech addressing how the lack of state funding for higher education could affect Colorado’s potential

Common vision

"Community leaders should heed Penley's advice. By presenting a unified front—a common vision—Northern Colorado can capitalize on its strengths without losing the unique characteristics that each community brings to the table."
—The Coloradoan, referring to remarks by CSU Chancellor Larry Edward Penley, when he urged Northern Colorado communities to work together to foster an economically viable region at the Community Foundation of Northern Colorado's annual luncheon

Common solution

"We are trying to come up with a sustainable way of mitigating the expansive soils problem in Colorado that takes into account the beneficial use of a waste material that has great recycling potential."
—Antonio Carraro, assistant professor of civil and environmental engineering at Colorado State University, regarding testing a mixture of expansive soil and some of Colorado’s 40 million stockpiled rubber tires to bolster road bases

Tornado chasing

Colorado State University has completed testing a network of radars in Oklahoma's "tornado alley" to improve early warning systems for tornadoes and severe thunderstorms, possibly saving thousands of lives a year. CSU faculty and students monitored the radars 24 hours a day, seven days a week from computers in the College of Engineering. The project was a collaborative effort between the National Science Foundation Engineering Research Center for Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere and universities across the nation. An average 800 tornadoes are reported across the United States every year, leading to more than 1,500 injuries and 80 deaths, according to the National Weather Service.

Farm fresh

More people are buying fresh fruits and vegetables straight from the farm, according to a Colorado State University study. Nearly 30 percent of consumers prefer to buy their produce from farmers' markets and direct from producers, the study found, countering a trend of increasing supermarket purchases. The USDA reported that between 1994 and 2006, the number of U.S. farmers' markets doubled to more than 3,700, and the value of U.S. agricultural products directly sold increased 37 percent from $592 million to $812 million. Initial results suggest that farm-fresh purchasers are willing to pay 7 percent to 23 percent more for produce that is differentiated by being organic, local, or nutritionally superior. Typical farmers-market customers tend to be older, spend more on produce, live in midsize markets, and are more likely to be upper-middle income compared to supermarket consumers, the study concluded.

Trading fairly

Fair trade links food consumers and agricultural producers across the global north/south divide in an attempt to overcome the problems of increased poverty, social discontent, and environmental destruction attributed to contemporary global trade, say Colorado State University sociology professors Laura T. Raynolds and Douglas L. Murray. The two faculty members have explored the challenges and potential of global fair trade and examined efforts to enhance social justice and global environmental sustainability through market-based social change in their book, Fair Trade: The Challenges of Transforming Globalization. The authors reveal the challenges to transform globalization, emphasizing the inherent tensions in working both in and against the market, and demonstrate how creating fairer trade has become a common goal for people around the world. For more information, access www.colostate.edu/Depts/Sociology/cfats/.