Skin infections: UNamur partners in Win²WAL research project

Tinea is a skin infection caused by microscopic filamentous fungi that affects both humans and animals. These fungi, dermatophytes, thus disseminate these highly contagious superficial skin mycoses, known as dermatophytoses.

The aim of the TineaDiag project (Tinea for ringworm and Diag for diagnosis) is to identify precise molecular markers in dermatophytes to detect them with sensitivity and certainty, and to identify the most problematic infections such as those caused by antifungal-resistant strains. In this way, those likely to resist curative treatments and/or cause the most serious lesions can be identified, enabling an effective targeted therapeutic strategy to be adopted. The markers identified and validated by the project could then become prime targets for the development of innovative diagnostic techniques and therapeutic strategies, expected on the international market for better management of dermatophytosis skin lesions, both in human patients and animals, and in fine to reduce the incidence of these mycoses.

Legend: Schematic representation of the different stages of dermatophyte skin infection. Histological images of fungal invasion during in vitro infection on reconstructed human epidermis model or in vivo in human patient.

The project aims to extend the expertise of the Coris BioConcept company, already involved in the production of bacterial and viral diagnostic tests in the fungal field, with a particular interest in the veterinary sector.

At UNamur, Professor Yves Poumay and Dr. Émilie Faway work within the NARILIS Institute at the Cells and Tissues Laboratory (LabCeTi) of the Faculty of Medicine's Molecular Physiology Research Unit (UrPhyM). The team is collaborating with Professor Bernard Mignon of the Veterinary Mycology Unit at the University of Liège, who is coordinating this project, with support from the Coris BioConcept company.

• Coris BioConcept
• Narilis and URPhyM
• Unité de Mycologie vétérinaire de l'Université de Liège

With this project, researchers are tackling a real public health issue: the resistance of certain infectious strains to antifungals, the lack of identification, and therefore effective prevention, and the toxicity of certain treatments.

"The project caught the reviewers' attention because it is fully mature and is the fruit of the know-how of an entire team" says Yves Poumay.

The UNamur team:

• Prof Yves Poumay
• Dr Émilie Faway
• Eléa Denil

Professor Yves Poumay has a long-standing interest in epidermal cell growth factors. He joined UNamur as an academic in 1994, continuing the work of Professor Robert Leloup, who had already been cultivating epidermal cells since the 1980s. At the end of the 90s, under the impetus of the European Union, which wanted to reduce and then ban cosmetics testing on laboratory animals, Yves Poumay turned his attention to in vitro epidermal reconstruction, an alternative technique to animal experimentation. Today, his expertise in in vitro epidermis culture is internationally recognized. UNamur is also part of the COST European Network for Skin Engineering and Modeling (NetSkinModels), which enables expertise to be shared with other European teams.

Already in 2014, Professor Yves Poumay began his collaboration with the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine (Professor B. Mignon) at the University of Liège as part of the MycAvert project, a WB Health project funded by the Walloon Region.

This partnership had been initiated by ULiège veterinarians, who wanted to strengthen their research into dermatophytosis. The aim of the study was to evaluate the antifungal potential of specific peptides on dermatophytes. UNamur, with its expertise in the production of cultured human epidermis, acquired know-how in dermatophyte culture during the project and was able to develop an in vitro model of dermatophytosis on epidermis.

This model offers both advantages and limitations: it enables the condition to be studied on human tissue without recourse to living subjects, but remains a simplified model, lacking an immune system. Thus, it was essential to strike a balance between results obtained in vitro in cell culture and those that could be validated under in vivo conditions.

During her PhD thesis, Émilie Faway developed particular expertise in the study of dermatophytes. A new project, entitled MycEpi, was funded as part of SPW Research's Win²WAL program, following on from the MycAvert project. This project was coordinated by UNamur in partnership with Professor B. Mignon of ULiège, supported by StratiCELL (a UNamur spin-off - https://straticell.com/). Together, they proposed to validate the in vitro model through data collected on in vivo model. The results were published notably in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology, laying the foundations for the new TineaDiag project.