A research project for a new poultry vaccine at the Biodesign Institute aims to kill two birds with one stone.
Over the next three years, the project will try to create a vaccine against salmonella and avian pathogenic E. coli, two diseases that cost the poultry industry more than $80 million every year.
"The poultry industry is very important," said Melha Mellata, a research scientist working on the team under a $400,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
To save money and increase efficiency, the group is working on a vaccine that will target both diseases at the same time.
"We're trying to mix the two together," Mellata said.
To put them together, the researchers will combine E. coli genes with salmonella, Mellata said.
Salmonella would then transport the vaccine into the body, said life sciences professor Roy Curtiss, director of the Center for Infections Diseases and Vaccinology at the Biodesign Institute.
Curtiss said he first realized this use for salmonella when he learned it is similar to the polio vaccine.
"That led me to realize that salmonella might be harnessed and tamed to be a friend rather than an enemy," said Curtiss, who has been working with salmonella for the last 30 years.
Mellata said her background is in E. coli. The avian form of the bacteria, also known as APEC, is naturally found in the intestine. Mellata's research has focused on what causes the bacteria to be deadly in birds.
"If you don't know how bacteria causes diseases, you'll never know how to fight them," Mellata said.
The effects of APEC could become more far-reaching in the future as the bacteria becomes more resistant to current treatments, Mellata said.
"Now many antibiotics aren't effective," Mellata said. "We need a vaccine as soon as possible."
Curtiss said, with 9 billion chickens in the United States, even a small percentage of losses translates as a serious matter.
"Poultry consumption on a per-capita basis is higher than consumption of pork and beef," Curtiss said.
Not only is chicken the most common meat eaten by Americans, but half of the human cases of salmonella poisoning come from poultry, Curtiss said.
"If you control the E. coli and salmonella in the chicken, then we hope there would be a decreased transmittance … to the supermarket, to you and me," Curtiss said.
Assuming the vaccine proves to be a success, it would still be several years before it could be approved and marketed, Curtiss said. Though the effects of the vaccine will not be felt immediately, Curtiss said it will eventually be beneficial.
"It would enhance the safety of food," Curtiss said.
Education junior Brian Lampert said he is careful when handling chicken "at a common sense level."
Though food safety is a concern of his, Lampert said he doesn't worry about it every time he goes out to eat.
Reach the reporter at: claudia.koerner@asu.edu.
