Molecular Typing Of Salmonella Enterica Serovar Typhimurium
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$272,545.00
Summary
Salmonella mainly causes food poisoning and is a significant human health problem. Different Samonella forms are identified by serotyping and many serovars have been given a name . There are more than 2000 serovars. The best known serovar is Typhimurium which is the cause of 40% of salmonella infections. Typhimurium is so frequently involved in infections it is necessary to further divide it for outbreak investigations and long term monitoring of the organism. The only widely used method to subd ....Salmonella mainly causes food poisoning and is a significant human health problem. Different Samonella forms are identified by serotyping and many serovars have been given a name . There are more than 2000 serovars. The best known serovar is Typhimurium which is the cause of 40% of salmonella infections. Typhimurium is so frequently involved in infections it is necessary to further divide it for outbreak investigations and long term monitoring of the organism. The only widely used method to subdivide Typhimurium is phage typing, which is done only in major laboratories (2 in Australia). Phage typing is based on lysis patterns of a test isolate to a set of 34 phages. Phage typing has played a crucial role in tracking the organism, for example the emergence of a multidrug resistance new type (DT204c) in UK and US. The technique is simple but the problem is that reactions vary with slight change in conditions and scoring the reaction results is very subjective. We propose to replace the typing system with one based on the DNA method PCR, so it will be simple, fast and accurate. We will use a DNA fingerprinting technique called AFLP (amplified fragment length polymorphism) to find markers (DNA segments) that are specific to phage types and design PCR assays based on the markers we find. Such a typing system will retain the essence of phage typing by providing continuity of the valuable epidemiological database on phage types. Further the typing system could easily be expanded to accommodate any new types by finding more markers while the current phage typing system is very difficult to expand (last done in 1977 and is behind in our needs). This project will establish a general approach for designing typing systems based on molecular biology for other pathogens and could have a major impact on the surveillance of bacterial infections in the 21st century.Read moreRead less
Molecular Definition Of Neural Pathways In The Embryo And Adult Mouse
Funder
National Health and Medical Research Council
Funding Amount
$401,000.00
Summary
It is our objective to gain insight into the role of the Stem Cell leukaemia (SCL) gene in the central nervous system (CNS). SCL is known to play a crucial role in blood cell development and if aberrantly expressed can lead to T-cell leukemia. Although we do know that SCL is expressed in the brain, its role in the CNS has not been addressed so far and it is of great interest to us to study its potential function in neural development. We have designed a series of experiment in mice to elucidate ....It is our objective to gain insight into the role of the Stem Cell leukaemia (SCL) gene in the central nervous system (CNS). SCL is known to play a crucial role in blood cell development and if aberrantly expressed can lead to T-cell leukemia. Although we do know that SCL is expressed in the brain, its role in the CNS has not been addressed so far and it is of great interest to us to study its potential function in neural development. We have designed a series of experiment in mice to elucidate the expression pattern of SCL in the CNS, to identify the phenotype of neural cells that express SCL in different regions of the mouse brain, and to ablate the SCL gene at different time points during life (during embryonic development, just after birth and during adulthood). These experiments will be performed in conditional transgenic mice that have unique and precisely defined genetic alteration and are generated by us specifically for our research on the SCL-gene. This genetic approach is used to define the neuroanatomical and molecular bases of SCL-function in the brain.Read moreRead less