Talk at CES on 31 March 2015 at 11:00 am titled "Plasmodium infections kill avian hosts: studies combining traditional and new molecular methods" by Dr. Vaidas Palinauskas from Nature Research Centre, Lithuania

Share this story on

Facebook icon Twitter icon
Topic: 
Plasmodium infections kill avian hosts: studies combining traditional and new molecular methods
Speaker: 
Dr. Vaidas Palinauskas, Nature Research Centre, Lithuania
Date & Time: 
31 Mar 2015 - 11:00am
Event Type: 
Talk
Venue: 
CES Seminar Hall, 3rd Floor, Biological Sciences Building
Coffee/Tea: 
Before the talk
Abstract:

Avian malaria parasites (Plasmodium spp.) are prevalent worldwide, but information about their impact on birds, especially during primary infections is insufficient. In the first part of the talk I will overview the results of our recent experimental studies showing parasites development strategies and importance of the parasites to some bird
species; such data is underestimated in field studies. In the second part of the talk I will show the importance of the knowledge of classical biology and will illustrate how such information can be used together with new technologies. First, developing new methods to generate large amounts of purified DNA and working with single cells of pathogenic organisms, which can be separated using laser micro-dissection system. Both methods were developed using avian haemosporidian parasites and could be applied for molecular analysis of various microorganisms.

Speaker Bio: 
Dr Vaidas Palinauskas finished M.Sc. in Ecology at Vilnius University, Lithuania in 2005. In 2009 he defended his PhD thesis on Avian malaria parasites, focusing on their molecular and morphological identification, prevalence, specificity and virulence at the Institute of Ecology, Vilnius University, Lithuania. Since 2010 Dr. Palinauskas is working as Senior Researcher at P. B. Šivickis Laboratory of Parasitology, Institute of Ecology, Nature Research Centre, Vilnius, Lithuania. Since 2013 he is a board member for Baltic States in Scandinavian - Baltic Society for Parasitology. From 2006 to 2014 he had received several scholarships for work and studies on haemosporidian parasites in Sweden, France, Japan and US and is now collaborating with Dr Farah Ishtiaq in India. Main research areas: 1. Specificity and virulence of avian malaria parasites. 2. Genetic divergence of haemosporidian parasites and their identification based on the microscopic and PCR diagnosis. 3. Molecular and evolutionary biology of avian haematozoa. 4. Development of new molecular methods and studies with single cells of parasites.