Award details

Characterisation of the effect of heat on TSE agent strains

Reference	BBS/E/I/00000866
Principal Investigator / Supervisor	Dr Robert Somerville
Co-Investigators / Co-Supervisors
Institution	The Pirbright Institute
Department	The Pirbright Institute Department
Funding type	Research
Value (£)	25,506
Status	Completed
Type	Institute Project
Start date	01/10/2001
End date	31/01/2007
Duration	64 months

Abstract

The thermostability of TSE agents varies according to the strain of TSE but is little affected by the PrP genotype of the host. Analysis of these and other data shows that heat inactivation is biphasic and that the inflection point where rapid inactivation of the infectious agent takes place varies according to strain of agent. The rate of inactivation may also vary. We propose to extend these findings to characterise cattle BSE, experimental sheep BSE and derived murine models, and compare their properties with a range of murine TSE models. These data will provide the context for an assessment of the inactivation of a mixture of TSE murine strains and of sheep scrapie and BSE. Heating may alter the phenotypic properties of agent strains and to assess whether this can occur, tissue from animals infected with heat-treated TSE strains will be subjected to the same heating regime again and assayed as before to see if the thermostability properties have been altered.

Summary

unavailable

Committee	Closed Committee - Agri-food (AF)
Research Topics	X – not assigned to a current Research Topic
Research Priority	X – Research Priority information not available
Research Initiative	X - not in an Initiative
Funding Scheme	X – not Funded via a specific Funding Scheme

I accept the terms and conditions of use (opens in new window)

export PDF file

back to list new search