OSU Humanitarian Engineering Seminar Series

Ohio State-Ethiopia One Health Partnership

Overview of Activities and Opportunities for Partnership

Talk and Panel Discussion, Talk by:

Prof. Wondwossen Gebreyes College of Veterinary Medicine

Director of Global Health Programs

Wednesday, Jan. 15, 10:00am - 11:00am Room 260 Dreese Laboratory

Abstract of Talk: The Ohio State seven Health Science (HS) colleges in partnership with other collaborating units and external partners launched a mutually beneficial One Health partnership with Ethiopian academic institutes and other governmental research and outreach institutes. The key partners include the University of Gondar and Addis Ababa University. The OSU HS Deans and global health directors visited Ethiopia in 2012 and OSU established a One Health Taskforce that has been driving the activities of this consortium. The consortium identified key priority areas for engagement including 1) One Health Summer institute - focused on training and workshops; 2) Pilot research activities - including on Rabies, environmental health and cervical cancer and 3) Resource stewardship - strengthening communications capacity etc. The College of Engineering, through its various key units such as the Environmental engineering, Software engineering and Humanitarian engineering could play a key role in sustaining this partnership.

The faculty panel (for questions and discussion) will include:

Ohio State University - Wondwossen A. Gebreyes (College of Veterinary Medicine and Public Health / Chair of the One Health Task Force) and Michael Bisesi (Senior Associate Dean, College of Public Health)

University of Gondar - Desalegne M. Degefaw is an Academic Vice President of the University of Gondar (UoG).

Biographical Sketches:

Wondwossen Gebreyes - The major areas that my research is particularly focused are antimicrobial resistance, genotypic diversity and detection methods development of foodborne zoonotic pathogens. Specific activities in my laboratory include molecular characterization of genetic elements such as antimicrobial resistance genes, class-I integrons, and plasmids in strains of leading food safety problems such as multi-drug resistant ones. The work in our laboratory mainly focuses on swine. Therefore, results generated from our studies have direct relevance to the Pork industry. In addition, as we are dealing with foodborne pathogens that are capable of infecting multiple host specieis, the findings have significant impact on human health as well as food safety in other animal hosts. In addition I collaborate with other experts in viral foodborne pathogens (mainly norovirus) and parasitic foodborne hazards (Ascaris, Trichinella and Toxoplamsa). Other expertise in our laboratory include evaluation of DNA fingerprinting method for foodborne pathogens and comparative analysis of antimicrobial resistance among Salmonella isolates from humans and swine. Future Research: Development of molecular diagnostic/ detection methods using real-time PCR and microarray systems that enable accurate and rapid detection of multiple bacterial and viral foodborne pathogens simultaneously. Member of: American Association of Swine Veterinarians; American College of Veterinary Preventive Medicine; American Society for Microbiology; and International Association for Food Protection.

Desalegne M. Degefaw is an Academic Vice President of the University of Gondar (UoG) which is one of the biggest Universities in Ethiopia. The University of Gondar is one of the largest comprehensive Universities in Ethiopia with more than 25,000 students under 58 undergraduate and 64 postgraduate programs in five campuses. He has served as the vice president for academic, research and community services of the University in September 2009 and served the University in this position for the last four years. He has been working on creating international links and he was one of

the key people for the Ohio State University One Health Ethiopia program that we have been running for the last two years. Currently he is at OSU on a short term Fulbright scholarship granted by State Department. The objective of his visit to OSU is to develop a doctoral PhD

program which will be launched at the University of Gondar, strengthening existing partnerships between colleges and units between the two Universities, initiating new partnerships in various colleges, centers, departments, units, etc and shadowing in senior management meetings for experience sharing. He can be reach at desmen96@yahoo.com or his cell# (614)-620-6640.

Michael Bisesi, PhD, REHS, CIH is currently the Senior Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, Director of the Center for Public Health Practice, Interim Chair of Environmental Health Sciences, and tenured Associate Professor of Environmental Health Sciences in the College of Public Health at The Ohio State University.

Dr. Bisesi is also the PI and Director of the HRSA-funded Ohio Public Health Training Center. Prior to his appointment at OSU in 2009, he served for 19 years as a scientist (including 12 years as tenured Professor of Public Health), department chairman, and senior associate dean at the Medical College of Ohio and the University of Toledo College of Medicine and Health Science Campus. He was also the co-founder and Director of the tri-university Northwest Ohio Consortium for Public Health. At the beginning of his career he held positions as an occupational health (industrial hygiene) specialist at corporate Tenneco Chemicals Environmental/Medical

Affairs, and, as Assistant then tenured Associate Professor of Health and Safety at Indiana State University.

Dr. Bisesi is an Environmental Health Scientist, Board Certified Industrial Hygienist, ABIH Diplomat, AIHA Fellow, and Registered Environmental Health Specialist. His primary scientific expertise includes assessment (monitoring) of human exposure to and control of toxic chemicals and pathogenic microbes; applied environmental toxicology and microbiology; and, hazardous material/emergency incident recognition/response. Dr. Bisesi has authored/co-authored scientific journal articles, chapters in the Occupational Environment: Its Evaluation and Control (1st and 2nd ed), and chapters in Patty's

Industrial Hygiene and Toxicology (4th and 5th ed). In addition, he is author of the highly touted textbooks Industrial Hygiene Evaluation Methods (2nd ed) and co-author of two other volumes of the Handbook of Environmental Health (4th ed) entitled Biological, Chemical and Physical Agents of Environmentally Related Disease, and, Pollutant Interactions in Air, Water and Soil, respectively. He has served on several local, state and national committees, workgroups, and panels, and, is past Chair of the ABET Applied Science Accreditation Commission. He currently leads the HRSA National Network of Public Health Training Centers and Chairs the Association of Schools of Public Health (ASPH) Environmental Health Council. He is also member of the ASPH “expert panel” on the Future of Public Health.

Dr. Bisesi earned a PhD (1987) in Environmental Science from the State University of New York CESF in association with Syracuse University, and, BS (1980) and MS (1982) degrees in Environmental Science from Rutgers University. He also earned a graduate certificate/diploma in Pathophysiology from the University of Massachusetts-Lowell (2007), and, in Health and Medical Sciences (2001) from the Medical College of Ohio. He completed a faculty leave in 1998 at Harvard and Tufts University with emphasis on molecular analytical methods and

molecular epidemiology. He is from Syracuse, New York, is married to Christine Bisesi, MS, CHMM, CIH President/Owner Enviro-Health, Inc., and has two sons Nino and Nico.