The
Veterinary Training Research Initiative (VTRI) - VT0103
Food-borne zoonotic pathogens: Transmission, pathogen evolution and control - a programme of training and research
VT0103 led by PROFESSOR MALCOLM BENNETT - Faculty of Veterinary Science, University of Liverpool
It’s often said that if you don’t know where you’re coming from, you can’t know where you’re going. It’s a well-worn phrase but it’s profoundly true of the thinking behind the VTRI project being led from Liverpool University by Malcolm Bennett, Professor of Veterinary Pathology.
”You have an infection like Campylobacter which is believed to infect a third of a million people in Britain a year” says Professor French “and yet, in many cases, we just don’t know where it’s coming from – or the relative importance of the different sources of infection.” To find out, French and Bennett aim to assemble a research team that calls to mind the kind of expertise assembled for major police investigations into serious crime. Along with mathematicians, computer scientists and biologists from their own university, similar expertise will be drawn from the Universities of Lancaster, Manchester and Oxford – and from an NHS Trust, all in co-operation with the Health Protection and Veterinary Laboratories Agencies.
The research will start at “the scene of the crime” – where infections begin. Building on that, VT0103 will then go on to pinpoint the forces that drive both the transmission and the evolution of the pathogen under study. As well as Campylobacter, Salmonella and E. coli will also be tracked, using every weapon in the armoury of modern veterinary science, including molecular typing techniques, statistical genetics and space-time epidemiology. A web-based surveillance reporting programme will also be developed, with the aim of providing the Department of Health and Defra with a greatly improved targeting system when outbreaks of infection occur. This will not be confined to farm animals – the team will also investigate how human disease can spread from the wild animal population too.
In training terms, VT0103’s special gift is its spread of disciplines – from biology to mathematics, epidemiology to pathology, medical microbiology to wildlife ecology. A wide range of study is offered: under-graduate, post-graduate and postdoctoral, with short courses and workshops also available.
Further information is available on: Defra's science pages: ‘Food borne zoonotic pathogens: transmission, pathogen evolution and control’ (VT0103) and the University of Liverpool Veterinary Science website.
- First Annual Appraisal
(71 KB).
For more information, please contact the Programme leaders at: m.bennett@liverpool.ac.uk
Page last modified: 15 September, 2006