Peak Group

Supervisors: Dr Darren Grice, Dr Ian Peak and A/Prof Jenny Wilson (School of PAM)

Australian Indigenous children suffer chronic middle ear infection at amongst the highest rates in the developed world. Individuals and communities experience long term health, social, educational and economic consequences resulting from this infection. Developing an effective vaccine could prevent such infections, alleviate suffering and widen future life opportunities for all Australian children, particularly Australian Indigenous communities.

This project will expand on our successful pilot program in which we developed a novel conjugate vaccine that targets two of the main bacteria that cause middle ear infection in children, namely, Moraxella catarrhalis (Mcat) and Non-typeable Haemophilus influenzae (NTHi).

Techniques: immunology (including ELISA), microbiology, bacterial pathogenesis, biochemistry, NMR

Supervisor: Dr Ian Peak, Co-supervisor: Prof Vicky Avery (Discovery Biology at the Griffith Institute for Drug Discovery)

This project is aimed at improving delivery and availability of therapeutic drugs for infections, chronic diseases (eg diabetes, dementias), or cancers. The project team will investigate how compounds we have developed can more efficiently deliver drugs across the cellular barriers. This will open the way to use tablets or liquids for oral or intranasal use, and/or to improve drug delivery into the brain.

Current therapies for these diseases often require direct injection of drugs, because many of the drugs cannot cross the barriers of the gut, the oral mucosa, or the CNS. For chronic conditions such as diabetes or for neurological conditions, this means regular injections; for cancers this may require an intravenous line in place for days or weeks. Regular injections or long term vascular catheters are a risk for infection, inconvenient, or both. There is also a strong imperative to address the growing threat of antibiotic resistance, by improving oral delivery of antibiotics that can only currently be injected.

The supervisory team also includes experts in antibiotic resistant bacteria and antibiotic delivery (Associate Professor Gary Grant), in lipid nanoparticle formulation and delivery (Professor Kevin Morris), and in organic chemical synthesis and analysis (Dr Matthew Zunk).

Supervisors: Dr Darren Grice, Dr Ian Peak & Dr Jennifer Wilson (School of Medical Science)

Medicinal Chemistry, Molecular Microbiology

The aim of this project is to isolate surface carbohydrate components from bacteria in the Moraxellacae family, then determine the structures and biological significance of these carbohydrate molecules. Many bacteria in this family are commensals of the human upper respiratory tract and are important in protecting against disease. Obtaining structural carbohydrate information will enable us to determine the role of these carbohydrates, and potentially developing new strategies to promote upper-respiratory tract health.

The project will require the development of knowledge and skills in the areas of cell culture, chemical and biochemical extraction and manipulation strategies, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and mass spectrometry (MS) of isolated carbohydrate materials.

1. De Castro, Grice, Daal, Peak, Molinaro, Wilson. Carb. Res. (2014) 388:81-86.

2. Wilson, Hitchen, Frank, Peak, Collins, Morris, Dell and Grice. Carb. Res. (2005) 340:4, 765-769.

Supervisors: Dr Ian Peak, Dr Christopher J Day & Prof Michael Jennings

Molecular Microbiology, Molecular Biology

The immune system responds to infections after it has recognised infectious agents. All bacteria secrete products, and some of these have profound effects on the host immune system, either acting as recognition molecules for immune attack, or by modifying the immune response to assist the microbe to survive. We are investigating how secreted molecules from pathogenic bacteria are detected. We are characterising host receptors for these secreted products, which will help understand diseases such as cholera, legionnaire’s disease, as well as infections caused by Pseudomonas in burned, and cystic fibrosis patients.

Techniques: Molecular genetics techniques, immunofluorescence microscopy, protein expression and purification, FACS analysis, cell culture and in vitro infections, in vivo infections using mouse models of disease, analyzing immune markers such as cytokine and chemokine responses of the host cell, small molecule purification and analysis by Mass Spectrometry and other techniques

Supervisors: Dr Ian Peak, Dr Matt Zunk (School of Medical Science & Pharmacy), A/ Prof Gary Grant (School of Medical Science & Pharmacy), Prof Vicky Avery (Griffith Institute for Drug Discovery)

Cell Biology, Microbiology, Medicinal Chemistry

Antimicrobial resistance is an increasingly urgent challenge to human health, with a growing number of multidrug resistant (MDR) and extensively resistant (XDR) species. Several antimicrobials considered “last resort” can only be delivered intravenously, as they do not easily cross from the gut into the blood stream if taken orally. However, long term use of intravenous antimicrobials causes higher rates of complications, resulting in more deaths, and contributes to emergence of further resistance. Our approach for improved delivery is to temporarily improve the permeability of the gut, using “permeation enhancer” compounds: by making the gut temporarily more permeable, the oral delivery of “last resort” antimicrobials can be improved.

This multidisciplinary project includes leaders from across Griffith.  You can develop skills in one or more of the following: chemical synthesis of the novel permeation enhancer molecules: cell biology and analysis of mucosal cell permeability: analyse delivery & antimicrobial effect on resistant bacteria; high throughput image analysis.  In the future, we will collaborate with other Glycomics investigators who are developing novel antimicrobials, and we will investigate using the permeation enhancers to target other diseases such as neurological conditions, and cancers.

Techniques: Cell biology; Synthetic chemistry; Hi-content image analysis microscopy.