Development of novel biotherapeutics for S.aureus infection

Intramammary infections (IMI) are a major source of financial loss for the Dairy industry worldwide. For the dairy producer, IMI represents a loss of saleable milk and an increase in medicalization costs, labor costs, and cow care efforts. Of the bacterial pathogens that cause IMI, Staphylococcus aureus (S. aureus) often leads to chronic colonization and long duration of infection, and remains difficult to either prevent or treat. Persistent intramammary infection caused by S. aureus mastitis leads to chronically high somatic cell counts, lower quality and volume of milk produced, and high management costs by the fact that the contagious and chronic nature of S. aureus requires a high repeated treatment rate, and eventually to a high culling rate. More than 80% of all antibiotic use in the dairy industry is directed toward treating mastitis, and in the case of S. aureus mastitis less than 50% of cases are eradicated even after multiple treatment regimens are applied. As more government and public initiatives attempt to minimize use of traditional antibiotics in the livestock industry, new strategies must be employed to find novel treatment opportunities for bovine mastitis. This proposal provides a novel, targeted approach to treatment of S. aureus mastitis, including two approaches to generate and test opsonins against S. aureus.


Due to the nature of this project, we seek strong candidates with a Bsc in Biochemistry, preferentially a MSc in Biochemistry, with protein-expression experience using mammalian/yeast expression systems. The successful candidate will be integrated in a large group of PhD students and post doctoral scientists at the immunology laboratory of the RVC. In addition, the student should be willing to spend several months with the industrial partner for the industrial placement included in this BBSRC-funded studentship.