Clouds, (fowl) Cholera and Contigs by Dr Pat Blackall

Event Details

Date:

Tuesday, 11 October 2016

Time:

12:00 pm - 1:00 pm

Room:

Large Seminar Room (3.142), Level 3 Qld Bioscience Precinct Building 80, St Lucia

UQ Location:

Queensland Bioscience Precinct (St Lucia)

URL:

Event category(s):

Full Description:: Fowl cholera is caused by the iconic bacterium Pasteurella multocida, an organism that heralded the dawn of the sciences of bacteriology and vaccinology. This presentation will overview the work performed in the last decade in the laboratories of QAAFI/DAF (and our collaborators) on methods to characterize and type this key pathogen. This work has advanced our understanding of the organism and the means to control the disease. However, the work has revealed that a far deeper knowledge is required to fully control disease outbreaks. There is a need to understand the genetic diversity (the clouds and the contigs of the title) that underpins the ability of this organism to evade vaccine protection and the activity of antimicrobial agents. The presentation will finish with an overview of our newly commenced industry-funded project in which we will use whole genome sequencing to improve our ability to control the emerging problem of fowl cholera in the growing free range poultry production systems.