Journal of Proteomics & Bioinformatics
Open Access

Identification of high affinity Adhirons for the development of rapid point-of-care diagnostics for Clostridium difficile infection

International Conference on Protein Engineering

October 26-28, 2015 Chicago, USA

Modupe Ajayi, Christian Tiede, Darren Tomlinson and Michael McPherson

University of Leeds, UK

Scientific Tracks Abstracts: J Proteomics Bioinform

Abstract :

Clostridium difficile is a leading cause of hospital acquired infection and antibiotic-associated diarrhoea. Point-of-care tests would be valuable for rapid diagnosis of patient with C. difficile infection both in hospital and community settings. Non-antibody binding proteins are increasingly being used as alternatives to antibodies and we have developed a very stable (Tm=101o C) nonantibody binding protein called Adhiron (commercialized by Avacta Life Sciences Ltd as Affimer Type II). High quality phage display libraries have been used to identify Adhirons against >200 targets. These have potential applications including as scientific research reagents, in diagnostics, imaging, therapeutics and drug discovery. We have identified a number of specific and non-cross-reactive binders against the three well established biomarkers of C. difficile infection, glutamate dehydrogenase, toxin A and toxin B. The characterization of these Adhirons and their use in developing a point-of-care diagnostic tool for C. difficile infection will be presented.

Biography :

Modupe Ajayi is currently a PhD student at the University of Leeds, United Kingdom. She is the recipient of several national and international scholarships including for her PhD. She is driven by the passion to use protein engineering as a tool for improving the quality of life.

Email: bs09moa@leeds.ac.uk