Bird flu breakthrough
Queensland researchers have developed a technique to crack the code of bird flu in a fast-paced bid to prevent a human pandemic like the Spanish Flu outbreak of 1918.
Professor Mark von Itzstein and his team at the Institute of Glycomics have found a way to study a surface protein of the virus without risk of infection, increasing the likelihood, and speed at which, effective anti-viral treatments can be developed.
"To interrogate a virus protein, researchers need to be able to observe and monitor the way it functions when associated with a virus particle," Professor von Itzstein explains.
"It’s similar to the way it would be difficult to work out how a gun functions by only studying the bullet.
"The use of virus-like particles as a vehicle for the virus protein enables researchers to work without the need for high-containment laboratory procedures.
"It effectively removes a key impediment to infectious disease research and may lead to the ability to crack the code of a variety of microbial disease targets," he said.
"Importing, transporting and studying highly-contagious live virus has always held some level of inherent risk for research staff, the wider community and agricultural economy.
"There are particularly strict regulations in a country such as Australia, in which the virus is not endemic. In the past, this has restricted the ability of Australian researchers to base research programs within their own institutes," Professor von Itzstein said.
The H5N1 virus has evolved to where it can be transmitted from birds to humans and evidence is mounting that it may also be transmitted human-to-human.
"The H5 protein is located on the surface of the bird flu virus, and acts like a biological glue enabling it to recognise and bind to certain carbohydrates on living cells," he said.
"The emergence of a pandemic human influenza virus from a bird flu parent appears to involve this protein developing an ability to switch from binding to the most common carbohydrate in a bird’s digestive tract to binding to the common carbohydrate in the human upper respiratory tract."
Professor von Itzstein said a related influenza-A virus, which was responsible for the 1918 pandemic that killed 50 million people, was strikingly similar to the avian flu.
"The mutation of just one amino acid in the protein-binding site appeared to determine the 1918 virus’ preference for human carbohydrates. There’s no reason why H5N1 couldn’t do the same, resulting in a human pandemic," he said.
The Institute of Glycomics will use their discovery in the quest for carbohydrate-based anti-viral ‘plug’ drugs that block the ability of disease to replicate and spread.
Professor von Itzstein, an Australia Prize winner, co-developed the first novel carbohydrate-based influenza treatment, Relenza.
The institute is the only research centre in Australia dedicated to the science of glycomics - the study of the role of carbohydrates in healthy biology and disease.
The Queensland Government has committed $11 million to the $22 million expansion of the institute, with a new, purpose-built facility currently under construction at Griffith Gold Coast campus.
www.griffith.edu.au/science/institute-glycomics
Story: Nerida Liedloff
Last reviewed 16 June 2008
