Project Number: 1245-42000-016-01
Project Type: Reimbursable

Start Date: Apr 01, 2011
End Date: Mar 31, 2015

Objective:
1. Develop serological assays that differentiate swine chronically infected with zoonotic T. spiralis from swine only transiently exposed to T. murrelli. 2. Estimate how frequently pastured pigs and feral swine are exposed to infection with enzootic and zoonotic species of trichinella.

Approach:
Screen expression libraries of T. spiralis and T. murrelli with hyper-immune sera from swine to identify clones encoding species-specific diagnostic antigens. Develop antibodies that discriminate among the two types of infection. Test in experimentally infected swine. Apply to panels of serum collected from feral swine and pastured pigs. Validate against genotyped parasite specimens obtained from tissue samples matched with serum.