Improved Methods for Purifying Giardia
Giardia is a protozoan parasite that causes gastroenteritis in all classes of vertebrates and affects approximately 280 million people worldwide annually. Giardia is difficult to manipulate in in vitro environments, which hampers the development of effective disease management strategies.
To redress this, IDReC researchers have developed an improved method for the purification of viable Giardia cysts from faecal samples. This protocol produces a 10‐fold increase in yield over current methods. By combining sucrose flotation with gated filtration, the protocol significantly reduces the amount of debris in the purified cysts suspension. The ability to purify larger quantities of Giardia from faecal samples could advance the development of effective treatments to target this worldwide prevalent parasite.
IDReC researchers Paul Ogbuigwe, Anthony Pita,Matthew Knox, Niluka Velathanthiri and David Hayman published these findings in the most recent issue of Current Protocols in Microbiology.
Access to the full article can be found here
https://currentprotocols.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/cpmc.117