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The Eliava Institute
In its heyday in the 1970s and 80s, nearly 800 people worked
in the Industrial Branch of the Eliava Institute, using enormous vats,
pill stampers and automatic bottling machines to pump out tons of phage
products for military and civilian uses all over the Soviet Union.
Another 200 worked to analyze hundreds of thousands of bacterial samples
that continuously poured in at the direction of the Soviet Ministry of
Health, testing the phage cocktails for efficacy and constantly isolating
new phage and making refinements. They also fought infectious
disease in other ways – vaccines, immune enhancers, probiotic bacterial
cultures – but phage were their main focus. By then, Institutes and
factories in places like Gorki and Ufa were also producing these phage
products for Soviet use, but Tbilisi phage were especially prized as far
away as Lithuania even in 1990. Guram Gvasalia, chief surgeon at the
enormous State Hospital, has relied heavily on their phage preparations
against purulent bacteria like Staphylococcus, Streptococcus and
Pseudomonas to prevent and treat severe infections for over 25
years. The complex “pyophage” mixtures he uses contain over 30
phages against 5 key bacteria, and are continually refined by his
collaborators at the Bacteriophage Institute to control any bacterial
strains currently prevalent in the hospital. They are particularly
important for such challenging cases as bone infections (osteomyelitis),
diabetic foot ulcers and bed sores, where lack of circulation as well as
bacterial resistance block antibiotic treatment.
International Grants: INTAS-Georgia (joint funding
from EC and Georgia) - Bacteriophage - a new approach for combating of the
nosocomial respiratory infection caused by Ps. aeruginosa, PI - Dr. Nina
Chanishvili, Co-ordinator - Dr. Paul Barrow, UK, - 50.000,00 EURO;
CRDF Grant N 527 A new strategy for control of potato bacterial
diseases based on application of specific phages, PI, Dr. Marina
Tediashvili (IBMV, GE), 150 000 US dollars; INTAS Open Call - An
epidemiological study of outbreaks of B. anthracis in Georgia, PI-
Professor Sergo Rigvava, Co-ordinator Professor Richard Sharp, CAMR, UK -
90 000 Euro; CRDF - Regional Experimental Support Centers Program -
Regional Experimental Center for Applied and Microbiology Research
(RECAMBR), PI-Dr. Nina Chanishvili - 316 000 US dollars
Scientists from the Eliava Institute are also collaborators
on other international grants where the PIs are from other Georgian
institutions; CR: Eliava Institute lead collaborator INTAS Grant N
1390 - The Biological Dispersion Phenomenon and the Energetic of
Microplankton: A Search for the Regularities and the Relationship to
Environmental Fluctuations, CR Marina Tediashvili, Co-ordinator Professor
Richard Kemp University of Wales, UK, 150 000 Euro; INTAS FOOD-2000,
Prevention of food spoilage by suppression of phenoloxidase perioxidase
and growth of pathogenic micro-flora by use of natural inhibitors of plant
origin, CR - Dr. Marina Tediashvili, Co-ordinator , Dr. Jose Neptuno
Rodrigues Lopes, University of Mursia, Spain- 120 000 Euro;
INTAS-Polluted Environments - Evaluation of coastal pollution status
and bio-indicators for the Black Sea (BIOBS), CR - Dr. Marina
Tediashvili,Co-ordinator Dr James Wilson, Center for the Environment
Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland - 120 000 Euro;
Eliava Labs and People: August, 2002
Many people seem to be considering visits to Tbilisi or at least
raising questions about the Eliava Institute - hopefully this introduction
to the human and physical topology there will be some help.
Lab Groups - these individuals also form
the governing Institute Lab Council: (A number are involved in the
various grants and proposals - see International Support) 1. Director
Teimuraz Chanishvili -- MD, PhD, DSc, Prof. 2. Molecular Biology in
Phage Characterization and Application: Rezo Adamia - PhD, DSc, member of
Parliament, just chosen Georgian ambassador to the United Nations ---
(Staph,, Pseudomonas, Salmonella primarily) -- PhDs Nana Balarjishvili,
Mzia Kutateladze and Leila Kvachadze. 3. Amiran Meipariani - MD, PhD,
DSc -- Group Chief; Former head of the Industrial Production Facility
4. Physiology and Morphology of Phages -- PhD Zemphira Alavidze; PhD
Marina Goderdzishvili -- isolating and characterizing new therapeutic
phages (including all components of Pyophage and Intestiphage); phage
preparation and stabilization techniques 5. Phage Selection and
Taxonomy Liana Gachechiladze MD, PhD, DSc -- Pseudomonas, E. coli,
Serratia. Enterobacter, Proteus - 6. Biochemistry: Tina Birkadze, PhD,
DSc; PhD Manana Loladze - Enzymes such as Hyaluronidase for phage and
other medicinal purposes 7. Storage and Collection of Bacteria and
Phages PhD, Marina Darsavelidze - 8. Virology -- Prof. Inga Georgadze,
MD, PhD, DSc, -- influenza, adenovirus, interferon; also clinical
diagnostics; PhD, DSc Nana Tophria 9. Ira Chirakadze PhD, DSc Group
Chief 10. Microbiology (d'Herelle's original lab)-- Tato Gabisonia -
DVM, PhD, DSc Prof. -- various animal pathogens, especially staph; new
human clinical cocktails of several sorts 11. anaerobic phages PhD
Guliko Tskhvediani - Botulinus, Clostridium, etc. 12. Immunology PhD,
DSC Sergei Rigvava - particularly anthrax Two new groups have been
elevated to independent laboratory status this year: 13. microorganism
and bacteriophage genetics PhD Nino Chanishvili - Lactobacillus; recently
some pseudomonas phage sensitivity studies 14. microbial ecology. PhD
Marina Tediashvili - environmental monitoring, plant pathogens, food
safety
A Physical Introduction to the Eliava Institute
and its Groups
As one enters the spacious Eliava Institute compound, there is a small
building on the right used as a clinic to see patients and then a larger
building on the left which has the Administrative Offices and two meeting
rooms, on the second floor. This is the domain of Academician Teimuraz
Chanishvili - Director of the Institute since 1997. He has been at the
Institute since 1949 and was Scientific Director from 1965 to 1997; before
that, he had briefly directed the Production Facility. In the mid-1990's,
there was a period of uncertainty in the Institute status after the USSR
broke up and the Institute no longer was under the All-Union Ministry of
Health. The Industrial Production part underwent privatization, with 8
small companies being formed and a general struggle for survival,
individually and collectively. (It is unclear how the decisions were made
as to where the line was drawn defining the Research parts of the
Institute, which were unequivocally not to be privatized, or who got the
various parts of the old Production portion.) By 1997, the Scientific part
became the Institute of Bacteriophages, Microbiology and Virology of the
Georgian Academy of Sciences.
Straight ahead is the H-shaped Main Building, with sweeping stairs
leading up to the main entrance on the second floor. The ground gradually
drops off toward the Mtkvari River, so that there are still two more
floors above ground in the back section. The front section has a very long
wing extending out to the right. Photograph
Second (main entrance) floor: Left side: Front: small computer room,
set up with internet access and security gates - but the Academy-supplied
computer was recently taken back into the Director's building and labs
without computers must now go to the few labs that have grants and access.
General English lessons (supported by the PhageBiotics Foundation) are now
held there. Back: Rezo Adamia's main lab space - with a strong
security gate and 5 lab/office spaces. Leads: Nana Balarjishvili, Mzia
Kutateladze, Leila Kvachadze; Technicians: Rusiko Patazidze (background in
physics and with Liana); Nanuka (makes media) Students: Sophi (ours; came
as Master's student from the Technical University. Tamuna Abuladze, who
was one of our first students for 1 year and then spent 2 years in
Maryland w. Sandro, plans to return soon as a PhD student, as a
grant-supported participant with Mzia.
Right wing, second floor is a very large privatized space:
"Biochimpharm", under Alexandr Golejashvili (Aleko), who also is formally
a member of Liana Gachechiladze's lab at the Institute; Biochimpharm and
Liana together have just been awarded an ISTC grant to integrate research
and production of new phage formulations against several gram-negative
bacteria and are already refurbishing while negotiating the final work
plan. Biochimpharm has licensure to make tablets against dysentary, etc.
The area is in relatively good shape physically, with large old fermenters
and stamping machines that could make 100,000 tablets per hour - far too
much for Georgia, and they are looking into markets for their products.
Third floor, front section, reached by a broad sweeping
staircase: Left lies the large library, the stacks of which house an
amazing, extensive collection of early phage and microbiology work.
However, the ceiling in the reading room is badly damaged and falling and
they have few resources for repairs or current journals and books. At the
T4 meeting, State Dept. representatives David Allen and Elizabeth Scharl
suggested the possibility of getting a small grant for library
infrastructure facilities through the ISTC - a proposal is needed
here.
The center front of building contains a large old lecture
hall.
Right: The first rooms on both sides of the hall, Nino
Chanishvili's space, are being renovated with a mix of funds, to be shared
between her group and the new CRDF-funded "Regional Experimental Center of
Applied Microbiology and Bacteriophage Research" (RECAMBR), required to be
open for users from throughout the region; this is discussed in detail
elsewhere. There are then three rooms which will provide additional space
for the Adamia group, to be renovated with money built into their upcoming
ISTC grant. The last 5 rooms before a set of double doors belong to
Marina Tediashvili and the phage ecology lab; the renovation is complete,
using funds from her CRDF/3M potato pathogen grant.
The space beyond the double doors, which also has its own stairway
access, is being developed into a badly-needed joint therapeutic phage
research-scale production facility. The attic area above will again become
an animal quarters for product testing. The heads of the 4 labs carrying
out such production and several others from the Institute have just formed
a nonprofit foundation to raise money for this purpose, since the
Institute has not been able to provide any funding for it since first
committing the space several years ago. The project and its importance are
discussed elsewhere.
Bottom floor, right front wing: The proximal portion houses the
electron microscope center and a very large ultracentrifuge and storage
room. It has no windows but has direct same-level outside access. The
outer, privatized part was rented by its owner, Lela **, to a German
bakery! This is being fought by most at the Institute as illegal and a
potential serious hazard in a building with this sort of biological
pathogen work. Through some means Lela won the first round of the court
battle and it was open for 1 ½ years but it is currently closed.
Back wing of the building: extends primarily to the left. second
floor right end Ketevan (Leana) Gachechiladze - Lab of phage taxonomy and
selection -- 4 small rooms currently in use. [Note: she also has a pair of
relatively unused rooms on the right along the corridor between the two
buildings. She currently has only a small grant from Intralytix and a
little help from us. She is included in various ways on several grant
proposals from other groups, including being on the Adamia lab ISTC grant,
and also works with the Clinic to test phage sensitivities, etc. - right
now her lab is supported with that plus the small Intralytix grant.] She
has one of our students, Marina Dzaliashvili, working on finishing degree;
Tamula Meschi, Liana's age, excellent with isolating and preparing
therapeutic phage; technicians Marica (about 30) and Dodo (about 50), who
do such things as prepare media, and A. Golidjashvili, all of whom are
half time on her official List. Until she gets significant funding, most
of these are mainly supporting themselves by working elsewhere, such as
with Inga's Diagnostic company. She also on paper has Teimuraz's nephew
Sviadi Chanishvili, who was also one of the people getting space on
privatization - 1 floor in big factory building, plus room next to Marina
in lower back part. [He was the one Nino rented the space from for her
venture with Caisey - rooms were then renovated, but he doesn't seem to
have done much anywhere since.]
Then office of Amiran Meipariani -
Chief over 3 neighboring labs
Lab of Zemphira Alavidze and of
Marina Goderdzishvili (who is on maternity leave): Physiology and
Morphology of phages - have quite a large lab (get names) and have made
phage preparations for hospitals, military, phage bioderm - pyophage,
intestiphage, staph, individual phages - renting some space/rights from
the Institute for that part. (They have discussed this arrangement with
the Vice-Director of the National Academy and have set this up similarly
to commercial ventures tied to another Institute of the Academy, with
things properly set up to pay taxes on any actual profits they generate.)
For a couple of months when the power was shut off, Lado (see below) let
them use some of his excess capacity and electricity free of charge, with
them supplying all materials, to continue to make their preparations for
the hospitals, etc. They make only about 30 liters/month currently.
End of hall, fairly isolated, with doors: Guliko Tskhvediani -
phages of anaerobic bacteria [These are among the most pathogenic
bacteria at the institute.]
Third floor: up a very narrow stair in Liana's area, the old low attic
rooms of Nino Chanishvili and Marina Tediashvili
First floor, back wing - Laboratory of Microbiology (Eliava's
original lab) - Dr. Dr. Tato Gabisonia (also on the faculty of the vet
school) - plus Dr. Dr. Ira Chirakadze and Lamara Chanishvili (who did
excellent Shigella T-even pseudolysogeny work - both of these women have
been at the Institute 50 years, and learned from people who worked closely
with Eliava and d'Herelle!). The lab studies both veterinary and human
therapeutic applications - it is a large group, with 2 vet students and
one of mine, and a wide range of collaborations inside and outside the
Institute. They have a BTEP grant involving Constantin Severinov as US
partner and a mastitis grant submitted to Ukraine program, with Katsarava
and me; Their lab is also now preparing and selling 4
Institute-approved new human phage preps
Laboratory of Biochemistry - right end of floor - Tina Birkadze and
Manana Loladze; Manana has focussed mainly on hyaluronidase and its
applications for 20 years and is just finishing her Dr.Sci; she now is
working more closely with Tato's group, bringing her cell-surface and
hyaluronidase expertise to bear in both infection-process and therapeutic
cocktail work.)
Ground floor, left at back under Tato, with outside entrances to each
suite- Storage and Collection of Bacteria and Phages - Marina
Darsavelidze -- a small lab focussing particularly now on Pseudomonas from
throughout Georgia and also making some new commercial phage
cocktails.
Virology -- Inga Georgadze, daughter of a former long-time Institute
director, is actively involved in providing therapy in a small clinic at
the entrance to the grounds where patients are regularly treated for
various kinds of problems and various phage preparations, supplements and
immunological reagents are sold. She also has a rented space in a separate
building that she renovated and uses for the diagnostic work of her
company "Diagnos 90", discussed under companies.
Immunology:
Sergei Rigvava: -- in a separate very high-containment building nearby,
focussing particularly on serological aspects of Anthrax of veterinary
origin, now supported with a substantial grant and expanding their work
with Anthrax phages
Other significant players: Lado Gulisashvili and Lela
Kalandarishvili: Have most of original big main production plant - for
BioPharm company, making vitamins, various biological reagents, probiotics
and currently also about 20 liters a month of phages - continuing those
being produced number of years early, without research or upgrading. Now
working at about 40% of capacity - did much to obtain all sorts of
equipment, from bankrupt companies, including in Moscow. Lela, a
biophysicist and the main person involved with phages, was once with Rezo
working on basic problems in DNA packaging. There are some disputes
currently involving some spaces in the main building that she claims or
also owns. Sviadi Chanishvili - nephew of Teimuraz; has some space
next to Marina Darsavelidze and one floor in Lado's building, the old
factory. This latter is the area that Caisey Harlingten supported and Nino
Chanishvili refurbished for their rather short-lived 1997 joint venture
(depicted extensively in the BBC program The Virus that Cures) before
Caisey's company became Phage Therapeutics in Bothel, Washington. He had
his own generators then that were later stolen.
Ramaz Katsarava - developer, with Zemphira Alavidze, of Phage Bioderm
-head of the Research Center for Medical Polymers and Biomaterials
(RCMPB), Georgian Technical University. Originally he had a joint
appointment at the Biophysics Institute across the street from the Eliava,
where Tsotne Dzhavakishvili, Nino Mzhavia and Nino Trapaidze (all of whom
spent multiple years at Evergreen a decade ago) studied under Rezo
Vashakidze.
Guram Gvasalia - Chief Surgeon, main Regional Hospital; he als headed
the military medical support during fighting in Abkasian (where all
soldiers were supplied with little Piophage spray bottles); has worked
extensively with phage for over 25 years and virtually always uses it as
part of his surgical practice.
David Gamrekeli - biophysicist, Moscow State University - long-time
friend of people at the Institute who volunteers to teach the twice-weekly
student English classes and is now working with Zemphira Alavidze, Liana
Gachechiladze, Gvasalia and several advanced medical students on a project
exploring antibiotic/phage interactions and looking carefully at Gvasia's
clinical data from recent years. They are designing clinical trials tied
to several supurative types of infections such as diabetic foot
infections.
Georgian CDC: collaborations with Sandro Sulakvelidze of Intralytix and
with Nino Trapaidze on BTEP grants related to various microbial problems -
they are interested in developing phage collaborations and will soon have
a DNA sequencer and pulse-gel electrophoresis system that will be
excellent resources.
Georgian ISTC office: Prof. Irina Khomeriki,
PhD - khomeriki@istc.ru;
ikhomeriki@hotmail.com; http://www.istc.ru (The ISTC and Partner
grants listed here were taken from the list she supplied us with that
apparently includes current and approved pending grants.)
For more information contact Dr. Elizabeth Kutter at
t4phage@evergreen.edu. |