IN PROFILE: Stephen Barr

Print

By Vivien Fellegi
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Chasing the elusive cure for HIV
 
 
Western Canadian-native Stephen Barr grew up in a family that encouraged him to be curious. These days that sense of curiosity has him on the trail of discovering a solution to the scourge of HIV.
 
HIV researcher Stephen Barr has a surprisingly tolerant attitude toward the human immunodeficiency virus. He doesn’t view HIV as an enemy.
 
The virus needs a home, and it happens to have found a comfortable spot in people’s bodies. Like people, HIV is just looking for a place to survive.
 
But Barr’s job is to oust the virus from its haven, and he doesn’t feel sorry for it.
 
“In the end it’s killing people. It’s too bad. Find another host.”  Barr, a 32-year-old molecular virologist and assistant professor at the University of Western Ontario, has discovered a gene that blocks HIV, potentially preventing the spread of AIDS.
 
Scientists have known that humans produce chemicals called interferons, which fight HIV, but no one has been able to explain how these work. Four years ago, Barr identified a gene, TRIM 22, which is turned on by interferon. TRIM 22 stops the assembly of HIV, trapping it inside infected human cells.
 
For Barr, work has always been more like play. He sees his research as a “glorified hobby,” one he has pursued from the age of 17. Barr’s father, an engineer, taught his son to be curious. As he grew up in Calgary, Barr learned to see the world as a puzzle, and himself as a detective. 
 
“I was always just … trying to find out the answers to stuff ... that nobody knew.” HIV was the biggest mystery at the time, and Barr decided to ferret out its secrets and make a name for himself.
 
“This was my naivete at the time.” 
 
Barr realized he would have to find a new approach to the problem. At the University of Calgary, he focused his PhD on another parasite, Leishmania, and travelled to Ethiopia to study Leishmania patients. Their faces were scarred by disease, and they were shunned by their communities.
 
“It contributed to my drive to study infectious disease,” says Barr, “’cause you see their heartbreak firsthand.”
 
Armed with new research tools, Barr moved to the University of Pennsylvania to do a post-doctoral fellowship in the HIV field. His research was not always exciting. There were days and weeks when nothing was working. But Barr never considered quitting.  
 
“It’s all part of the challenge, trying to figure out why it isn’t working. And then you change things.”
 
He remembers the moment he knew he’d tracked down a potential cure for HIV. By this point he was back in Canada, doing a second post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Alberta. He saw that cells fortified with TRIM 22 did not produce the HIV virus. Barr didn’t jump to any conclusions though.
 
“The first thing that (came) to mind (was) that I must have screwed up … flipped the tubes or something.” 
 
But labs around the world duplicated his results. By February 2008 his conclusions were published in the journal Public Library of Science, and he went out for dinner and drinks with his wife.
 
“It was fun,” he says.
 
But in spite of achieving a breakthrough in HIV research, Barr remains unassuming, says his wife Jen. 
 
“He just thinks that everybody’s work is important, and that what he’s doing is not any more special than what anyone else is doing.” 
 
Barr also enjoys his time outside the lab. He bikes to and from work, and makes sure he gets home in time to tuck his one-year-old son into bed.
 
On weekends, the Barrs take their son to explore toys like bouncing castles. Dominic already takes after his father. Instead of jumping on the inflatable toy, he checks out the air pump to see how it works.
 
Meanwhile, his inquisitive father will continue tinkering with the HIV virus. Barr’s ultimate dream is to come up with a cure for HIV. He’s not certain it will happen in his lifetime, but he’s sure going to try.
 
“So long as that dream remains, I’m still chasing it.”  
 
Stephen Barr
Favourite book - A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry
Favourite animal – cheetah
Heroes - Albert Einstein, Leonardo da Vinci, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela
Last movie seen – Burn After Reading
Least favourite dish – brussels sprouts   
 
The writer is a graduate student studying Journalism.  
 

Also from this web page:

About

Hours

Weekdays
8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
(holidays excluded)

Contact

Publisher:
Helen Connell (hconnell@uwo.ca)

Editor:
Jason Winders (newseditor@uwo.ca)

Reporter/Photographer:
Paul Mayne (pmayne@uwo.ca)

Reporter/Photographer:
Heather Travis (htravis2@uwo.ca)

Advertising Coordinator:
Denise Jones (advertise@uwo.ca)

Off-Campus Advertising Sales:
Chris Amyot, Campus Ad (campusad@sympatico.ca)

National Advertising Representative:
Campus Plus

Phone:
519-661-2045

Fax:
519-661-3921

Mail:
Western News, Suite 360
Westminster Hall
The University of Western Ontario, London N6A 3K7

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Western provides the best student experience among Canada's leading research-intensive universities.