Myxozoan parasites are an unusual group of basal metazoan parasites causing severe disease in farmed fish species. Tetracapsuloides bryosalmonae causes proliferative kidney disease (PKD) in salmonid fish throughout Europe and USA. Its definitive host are colonial invertebrates called bryozoans. Spores from bryozoans along with fish infection and disease are tightly coupled to seasonally elevated water temperatures. Thus, disease spread, and severity has escalated in recent years due to climate change including an increase the parasite’s host range to non-salmonid fish.
PKD control is currently limited to pre-exposure programs on fish farms. However, a vaccine is the only long-term sustainable way of controlling the disease. Aberdeen researchers have developed parasite functional genomic resources for both hosts in the parasite’s lifecycle. A functional annotation pipeline has been developed to better understand transcripts and proteins the parasite expresses, especially during clinical disease within fish hosts. Given the parasite genome possesses many genes that encode orphan proteins, bioinformatic approaches have been extended to interrogate these based on sequence features associated with virulence and surface expression. This has already yielded a partially protective fish-specific orphan antigen in vaccine trials to date. Recent functional studies have revealed the protein to be a novel self-translocating virulence effector of fish lymphoid cells in infected kidney tissue, which is a first in the study of metazoan parasites.
The successful applicant will work alongside a post-doctoral researcher as part of a current EU (Cure4Aqua; https://cure4aqua-project.eu/)-funded project. Dr Kim Thompson (Moredun Institute) is an expert in fish vaccinology and will be the second supervisor on this project. This project will focus on further datamining of transcriptome assemblies and bioinformatic shortlisting of additional fish stage specific orphan antigens. Vaccine candidates will be generated as recombinants and will undergo immunoscreening via lab immunization and parasite challenge models using fish aquaria facilities at Aberdeen and at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna. Initially, signs of immune recognition will be obtained ex-vivo by re-exposing fish leucocytes to antigen following immunization. Immune and parasite gene expression profiling, cell proliferation assays, histological techniques, western blotting, and indirect ELISAs will be undertaken to determine correlates of immune recognition. This approach will further refine vaccine candidates for artificial intelligence selection of optimal protein epitopes to express via a cutting-edge recombinant epitope expression platform developed at Aberdeen for Covid-19 therapeutics (https://epitogenx.com/). Lab- and field-based vaccination and parasite challenge trials will be undertaken with the epitope-based vaccine incorporating molecular adjuvants to boost immunogenicity.
ELIGIBILITY:
Applicants should hold a minimum of a 2:1 UK Honours degree (or international equivalent) in a relevant subject. Those with a 2:2 UK Honours degree (or international equivalent) may be considered, provided they have (or are expected to achieve) a Distinction or Commendation at master’s level.
All students must meet the eligibility criteria as outlined in the UKRI guidance on funding for postgraduate training and development. This guidance should be read in conjunction with the UKRI Training Grant Terms and Conditions.
APPLICATION PROCEUDRE:
- Please visit this page for full application information: How to apply | eastbio (eastscotbiodtp.ac.uk)
- Please send your completed EASTBIO application form, along with academic transcripts to Alison Innes at pgr-mmsn@abdn.ac.uk
- Two references should be provided by the deadline using the EASTBIO reference form. References should be sent to pgr-mmsn@abdn.ac.uk
- Unfortunately, due to workload constraints, we cannot consider incomplete applications.
- CV’s submitted directly through a FindAPhD enquiry WILL NOT be considered.
- If you require any additional assistance in submitting your application or have any queries about the application process, please don’t hesitate to contact us at pgr-mmsn@abdn.ac.uk
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