Inactivation Strategies

Inactivation strategies for germ load reduction (AMPs).

Liner of the milking equipment, coated with patent AMP (O1) inside.
© Fraunhofer IZI-BB
Liner of the milking equipment, coated with patent AMP (O1) inside.

With the application of antimicrobial peptides (AMPs), surfaces can be endowed with a biocidal effect. For this purpose, non-toxic AMPs, of synthetic or natural origin, are immobilized on the respective materials. By using AMPs in medical devices, such as wound dressings, the use of antibiotics can be limited. The germ load is thus reduced without promoting the threat of resistance.

Services:

  • Coupling of peptides to desired surface by affinity or covalent binding
  • Coupling via "auxiliary matrices" on difficult substrates
© Fraunhofer IZI-BB

Microbial analysis

The current bioburden caused by bacterial pathogens in the areas of human medicine and veterinary medicine, and at the transmission from animals to humans, and not least the multi-resistant pathogens now emerging, make new and effective measures necessary for both combating and diagnosing these germs.

Highly specific antigens from the corresponding species of pathogen, isolated from an infection-relevant transcriptome, provide a basis for this. Depending on the situation, this involves isolating mRNAs from the pathogens using microarrays, and characterizing their resulting expressions for immunological purposes. Only the genes which are actually active when an infection occurs or their transcription products in the form of mRNA are therefore used as a basis for the identification of antigens. The method is fast and effective, and only requires a few cleaning steps.

Furthermore, the developments allow new instruments for immunodiagnostics (for example, highly specific antibodies) and new potential for generating selective vaccines to be derived. The method can be applied to any germ, and has already been used for a range of different pathogens, such as salmonella, campylobacter, staphylococcus, klebsiella, neisseria, pseudomonas, streptococcus and clostridium.

  • Prokaryotic cDNA expression libraries
  • Phage display
  • Microbial knock-out mutants

Devices

  • Anaerobic glovebox

  • RIPAC-Labor GmbH
  • Bovicare GmbH
  • ILBC GmbH
  • Robert Koch-Institut
  • IMTEK Freiburg
  • FU-Berlin, IMT

  • Connor DO, Danckert L, Hoppe S, Bier FF, von Nickisch-Rosenegk M. Epitope
  • determination of immunogenic proteins of Neisseria gonorrhoeae. PLoS One. 2017
  • Jul 19;12(7):e0180962. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0180962. eCollection 2017.
  • PubMed PMID: 28723967; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC5516995.
  • Connor DO, Zantow J, Hust M, Bier FF, von Nickisch-Rosenegk M. Identification
  • of Novel Immunogenic Proteins of Neisseria gonorrhoeae by Phage Display. PLoS
  • One. 2016 Feb 9;11(2):e0148986. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0148986. eCollection
  • 2016. PubMed PMID: 26859666; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC4747489.
  • Danckert L, Hoppe S, Bier FF, von Nickisch-Rosenegk M. Rapid identification of novel antigens of Salmonella Enteritidis by microarray-based immunoscreening. Microchimica Acta 02/2014; 3.43 Impact Factor
  • Hoppe S, Bier FF, von Nickisch-Rosenegk M. Rapid Identification of Novel Immunodominant Proteins and Characterization of a Specific Linear Epitope of Campylobacter jejuni. PLoS ONE 01/2013; 8(5):e65837.
  • Hoppe S, Bier FF, von Nickisch-Rosenegk M. Microarray-based method for screening of immunogenic proteins from bacteria. Journal of Nanobiotechnology 03/2012; 10:12.