Rima Menassa Ph.D.

Research Scientist

London Research and Development Centre

Current research and/or projects

Technology development of alternatives to subtherapeutic and metaphylactic antimicrobials used in the beef industry (2016-2022)

RNAi trap plants for horticulture (2018-2021)

Mitigating AMR (AAFC-GRDI) (2018-2023)

Development of an oral intervention method to eliminate shedding of Enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli O157:H7 by pigs. (Collaboration with PlantForm Corp.) (2020-2022)

Plant-based oral vaccine for PEDv disease. (AAFC AgriScience project) (2019-2022)

Research and/or project statements

Plants as bioreactors for the production of veterinary vaccines and antibodies as alternatives to antibiotics

Transforming the chloroplast genome of various plant species for the production of dsRNA for insect pest control, and for the production of veterinary vaccines

Education and awards

PhD. in Molecular Genetics, McGill University
M.Sc. in Plant Pathology, American University of Beirut
B.Sc. in Agriculture, American University of Beirut

Additional links

Researchgate

Google Scholar

rima.menassa@agr.gc.ca

Key publications

Kaplanoglu, E. , Kolotilin, I. , Menassa, R. , Donly, C. Transplastomic Tomato Plants Expressing Insect-Specific Double-Stranded RNAs: A Protocol Based on Biolistic Transformation. Methods in Molecular Biology. Volume 2360, Pages 235 - 252 (2022).
2021 - View publication details
Scott, I.M., Zhu, H., Schieck, K., Follick, A., Reynolds, L.B., Menassa, R. (2019). Non-target effects of hyperthermostable α-amylase transgenic Nicotiana tabacum in the laboratory and the field. Frontiers in Plant Science, [online] 10 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2019.00878
2019 - View publication details
Tran, H.H., Chen, B., Chen, H., Menassa, R., Hao, X., Bernards, M., Hüner, N.P.A., Wang, A. (2019). Development of a cucumber green mottle mosaic virus-based expression vector for the production in cucumber of neutralizing epitopes against a devastating animal virus. Journal of Virological Methods, [online] 269 18-25. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jviromet.2019.04.006
2019 - View publication details
Burke, W.G., Kaplanoglu, E., Kolotilin, I., Menassa, R., Donly, C. (2019). RNA interference in the tobacco hornworm, manduca sexta, using plastid-encoded long double-stranded RNA. Frontiers in Plant Science, [online] 10 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2019.00313
2019 - View publication details
Donly, C., Kaplanoglu, E., Ludba, K.K., Kolotilin, I., Menassa, R., and Scott, I.M. (2018) Effects of RNA interference on greenhouse whitefly (Trialeurodes vaporariorum). Insect Biotech Conference, St. Catharines, Ontario.
2018 - View publication details
Feeney, M., Kittelmann, M., Menassa, R., Hawes, C., Frigerio, L. (2018). Protein storage vacuoles originate from remodeled preexisting vacuoles in Arabidopsis thaliana. Plant Physiology, [online] 177(1), 241-254. http://dx.doi.org/10.1104/pp.18.00010
2018 - View publication details
Ceballo, Y., Tiel, K., López, A., Cabrera, G., Pérez, M., Ramos, O., Rosabal, Y., Montero, C., Menassa, R., Depicker, A., Hernández, A. (2017). High accumulation in tobacco seeds of hemagglutinin antigen from avian (H5N1) influenza. Transgenic Research, [online] 26(6), 775-789. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11248-017-0047-9
2017 - View publication details
Miletic, S., Hünerberg, M., Kaldis, A., MacDonald, J., Leuthreau, A., McAllister, T., Menassa, R. (2017). A Plant-Produced Candidate Subunit Vaccine Reduces Shedding of Enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli in Ruminants. Biotechnology Journal, [online] 12(10), http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/biot.201700405
2017 - View publication details
Reuter, L.J., Shahbazi, M.A., Mäkilä, E.M., Salonen, J.J., Saberianfar, R., Menassa, R., Santos, H.A., Joensuu, J.J., Ritala, A. (2017). Coating Nanoparticles with Plant-Produced Transferrin-Hydrophobin Fusion Protein Enhances Their Uptake in Cancer Cells. bioconjugate chemistry, [online] 28(6), 1639-1648. http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acs.bioconjchem.7b00075
2017 - View publication details
Donly, C., Kaplanoglu, E., Ludba, K., Kolotilin, I., Menassa, R., Scott, I. (2017) Insecticidal trap plants incorporating RNA interference technology. Insect Biotech Conference, St. Catharines, Ontario. 14-16 June 2017, oral presentation.
2017 - View publication details
Saberianfar, R. and Menassa, R. (2017) Protein bodies: how the ER deals with high accumulation of recombinant proteins. Plant Biotechnol J 15, 671-673.
2017 - View publication details
MacDonald, J., Miletic, S., Gaildry, T., Chin-Fatt, A., Menassa, R. (2017). Co-expression with the type 3 secretion chaperone CesT from enterohemorrhagic E. coli increases accumulation of recombinant Tir in plant chloroplasts. Frontiers in Plant Science, [online] 8 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2017.00283
2017 - View publication details
Arthur, L.L., Chung, J.J., Jankirama, P., Keefer, K.M., Kolotilin, I., Pavlovic-Djuranovic, S., Chalker, D.L., Grbic, V., Green, R., Menassa, R., True, H.L., Skeath, J.B., Djuranovic, S. (2017). Rapid generation of hypomorphic mutations. Nature Communications, [online] 8 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/ncomms14112
2017 - View publication details
Zhu, H., Reynolds, L.B., Menassa, R. (2017). A hyper-thermostable α-amylase from Pyrococcus furiosus accumulates in Nicotiana tabacum as functional aggregates. BMC Biotechnology, [online] 17(1), http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12896-017-0372-3
2017 - View publication details
Topp, E., Irwin, R., McAllister, T.A., Lessard, M., Joensuu, J.J., Kolotilin, I., Conrad, U., Stöger, E., Mor, T., Warzecha, H., Hall, J.C., McLean, M.D, Cox, E., Devriendt, B., Potter, A., Depicker, A., Virdi, V., Holbrook, L., Doshi, K., Dussault, M., Friendship, R.M., Yarosh, O., Yoo, H.S., MacDonald, J.D., and Menassa, R. (2016). "The case for plant-made veterinary immunotherapeutics.", Biotechnology Advances. doi : 10.1016/j.biotechadv.2016.02.007
2016 - View publication details
Miletic, S., Simpson, D.J., Szymanski, C.M., Deyholos, M.K., Menassa, R. (2016). A plant-produced bacteriophage tailspike protein for the control of Salmonella. Frontiers in Plant Science, [online] 6(JAN2016), http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2015.01221
2016 - View publication details
Menassa, R. (2015). "Protein body biogenesis and utility in recombinant protein production in Nicotiana benthamiana.", Recombinant Protein Production 8, Palma, Mallorca, Spain, April 22-24, 2015.
2015 - View publication details
Kolotilin, I., Topp, E., Cox, E., Devriendt, B., Conrad, U., Joensuu, J.J., Stöger, E., Warzecha, H., McAllister, T.A., McLean, M.D, Hall, J.C., and Menassa, R. (2015). "Plant-based solutions for veterinary immunotherapeutics and prophylactics.", BMC Veterinary Research, 45(1), pp. 375. (Abstract)
2015 - View publication details
Menassa, R. (2015). "Producing veterinary vaccines for bacterial diseases in transplastomic plants.", 2015 Chloroplast Biotechnology Gordon Research Conference, Ventura Beach, California, USA.
2015 - View publication details
Menassa, R. (2015). "Production and testing of plant-made subunit vaccine candidates for porcine epidemic diarrhea and enterotoxigenic E. coli.", Plant-Based Vaccines, Antibodies and Biologicals 2015, Lausanne, June 8-10, 2015.
2015 - View publication details