Speaker
Description
American foulbrood (AFB) is one of the most important and devastating infectious diseases of the Western honey bee Apis mellifera. It is caused by the gram-positive, spore-forming bacterium Paenibacillus larvae, which not only kills the brood of a colony but also the entire colony as the disease progresses. Since P. larvae is highly infectious and contagious, the disease spreads very easily within a colony and between colonies. Therefore, AFB is listed as a notifiable animal disease in many countries.
The species P. larvae is divided into several, so-called ERIC-genotypes, which also differ phenotypically. Only two of these genotypes, ERIC I and ERIC II, are currently driving the global AFB-outbreak situation. P. larvae ERIC I and ERIC II differ in their suite of expressed virulence factors resulting in variations in pathogenesis and virulence differences. Over the past two decades, we have intensively studied the species- and genotype-specific virulence factors of P. larvae, thereby deepening our understanding of the molecular pathogenesis of AFB. We have identified a chitin-degrading protein as key virulence factor of the species P. larvae, toxins and an S-layer protein as genotype-specific virulence factors, and unravelled the role of secondary metabolites during biotrophic and necrotrophic growth of P. larvae in the host. One practical result of this basic research is the recently completed development of a highly specific point-of-care immunoassay for P. larvae diagnosis.
| Registration ID | ECVM25-198 |
|---|---|
| Professional Status of the submitter, who is also the speaker | Professor |
Author
External references
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