Ascaris suum in a parasitic roundworm that lives in the small intestine of pigs. Natural infection occurs when pigs ingest a viable egg from the environment. The egg hatches in the intestines and the larva penetrates the intestinal wall and migrates through the liver and the lungs to be swallowed again. The worm finally matures in the small intestinal tract and stays there to grow into adulthood.
However, pigs that get exposed to the parasite daily form an immunity against the larvae, so the larvae can not penetrate the intestinal wall anymore an thus cannot complete their life cycle.
Our goal is to detect larval antigens that induce this type of immunty in pigs. Therefor we use local, mucosal antibodies from the intestine of immune pigs on western blots with different extracts of the larvae.
Once a target is selected, the process of identification and purification starts. Then eventually the target will be used in a vaccine trial to test its protective capacities against a challenge infection with A. suum in pigs.