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Beyond the Frontiers of Medical Mycology

Module description

Fungi pose a significant threat to human health, with fungal diseases remaining a leading cause of death and morbidity worldwide.  In this module students will review research in four major selected fields of medical mycology and will explore how new hypotheses are made that can inspire future research.  The course will focus on very recent advances in our understanding of fungal pathogen biology, fungal immune recognition and avoidance, mycobiomes and co-infections, and vaccines, diagnostics and antifungal drug resistance.  You will dissect key research papers to understand the advances that have been made and explore how emerging insights might be tested.

Module aims - intentions of the module

The course title “Beyond the Frontiers” alludes to thinking beyond current paradigms to conceive of methodologies and testable hypotheses that could advance the field of medical mycology. A major objective will be to get students to “think like a researcher” and to look beyond information as a collection of facts and consider them as inspiration to generate testable ideas using the “scientific method”.

The lecturers delivering the course will focus on recent publications (over the last 2-3 years) that establish new paradigms and create new perspectives. The delivery will be deep rather than broad.  The class will discuss the robustness of the evidence underpinning assertions made in these studies and learn how to develop hypotheses, Students will be encouraged to consider what alternative explanations may explain the data and clarify the insights gained. Students will be guided about how to stand on the foundations of the work that has been discussed in class and how to map out a plan of experimental investigation that will extend the frontiers of the study.

Each of the four topics will include an introductory session of three lectures describing the state of understanding in the topic and include an introduction to a small group of selected recent papers. This will be followed by academic-led round-table discussions in small group tutorials (2 h). These tutorials will provide an opportunity to critically assess original research articles related to the module content, promoting your engagement with the research literature and your critical appraisal of research studies. Through these activities, the module aims to build your confidence in understanding and discussing complex research ideas and findings and then using that information to critically assess what should be done next to develop that research field. These tutorials will also form the basis of the in-course summative assessment.  You will also be given help in how to prepare a short research proposal in a grants workshop.

A formative assessed element will be chosen from Topics 1 and 2 by you and that will develop the skills you will need to acquire for the assessed summative element towards the end of the course.  The formative assessment will develop your understanding about how to undertake a deep literature review, how to generate a hypothesis-led framework of understanding of a topic and will include feedback to materials gathered from grant writing workshops.  The formative assessment will involve peer-to-peer and academic feedback from small group workshops where the outputs of your work will be presented in the format of a grant review panel.

The summative assessed element will be based on topics 3 or 4 and will use of a pro forma template where you will devise a research plan to test a prevailing hypothesis and develop a research plan of new experimentation.  This will be based on a deep understanding of a small number of recent high profile research publications on the topic. In the assessment you will provide a summary of the background research and literature leading up to the formulation of the hypothesis.  The assessment will include a plan of experiments, predicted outcomes and how these outcomes would help support or refute the hypothesis.  You will be encouraged to use all available open research platforms to develop your research project proposal in the same way as a research scientist Principal Investigator would develop their thinking about a new research project in preparation for a funding application.  You are encouraged to talk to each other peer-to-peer and to other people in the field who could provide information and inspiration about how to develop your research programme. 

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Critically evaluate recent research on four major research topics relating to fungal pathogenesis, fungal immunology, the interactions of fungi with other microorganisms and the effect of those interactions on human health and disease, and contemporary strategies designed to contain the rising tide of important fungal infections.
• 2. Use resources in the form of published literature, peer-to-peer discussion and creative analysis to formulate your own view of the strengths and limitations of our current understanding of these topics.
• 3. Outline and critically evaluate the various host-pathogen elements that determine the outcome of infection by pathogenic fungi.

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 4. Discuss how fungal pathogens adapt to the host environment and how the host adapts to the presence of a fungal invader
• 5. Critically compare the ways in which fungal modulate the host response to infection, understanding that that outcome is also dependent on other important factors – pathogen biology, host immune resilience, co-infection, drug resistance.
• 6. Evaluate the future of disease control strategies and the challenges posed in developing new drugs, vaccines and immunotherapies.
• 7. Evaluate in detail approaches to the understanding the frontiers of medical mycology in terms of methodology used, and the prevailing hypotheses and paradigms of understanding of the field.

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 8. Be able to critically assess the strengths and weaknesses of the assertions made in research publications facts and understand how to look beyond current knowledge to test emerging hypotheses and ideas
• 9. See information as ideas to inspire scientific investigation rather than facts that are immutable and outside intellectual scrutiny
• 10. Understand how to put together a simple research proposal that is based on the foundations of currently published work
• 11. Be confident in your appreciation of how new research knowledge is generated and the tested to advance the frontiers of this, and other biosciences fields

Syllabus plan

Through a combination of lectures and small group tutorials, the module will explore how advanced reading and analysis of research topics can lead to the formulation of testable hypotheses and research plans that will advance the frontiers of medical mycology. You will develop this understanding in the context of the latest developments in:

• Fungal pathogen biology: How fungal pathogens adapt and change within the various niches of the human body. 
• Fungal immune recognition and avoidance How the immune system recognises fungal pathogens and how fungal pathogens disguise themselves to avoid immune detection and destruction.
• Mycobiomes and co-infections. What is the consequence to disease when fungi are present within influence homeostasis and the outcome of disease.

Vaccines and diagnosticsand antifungal drug resistance. What are the challenges in designing fungal vaccines and diagnostics, what future innovations can be applied to fungal diagnostics and what are the latest trends in Antifungal Drug Resistance (AFR) and the challenges of misuse of antifungals.

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons that are approved by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. If deferred, the format and timing of the re-assessment for each of the summative assessments is detailed in the table above ('Details of re-assessment'). The mark given for a deferred assessment will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral - if you have failed the module (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 40%) and the module cannot be condoned, you will be required to complete a re-assessment for each of the failed components on the module. The format and timing of the re-assessment for each of the summative assessments is detailed in the table above ('Details of re-assessment'). If you pass the module following re-assessment, your module mark will be capped at 40%.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

• Relevant primary research articles and review articles that support individual lecture topics will be made available on ELE

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

• Oxford Textbook of Medical Mycology
• Module-specific ELE page

Key words search

Fungi, pathogenicity, virulence, molecular biology, immunology, research methods