KRISP NEWS
This month, we focused our newsletter on KRISP on the road. We are criss-crossing the country to showcase our new DNA sequencing and bioinformatics capacity. . In the newsletter, we also cover our high-throughput Sanger and Illumina sequencing services, arapid, reliable and cost effective HIV-1 Drug Resistance Service in Africa and many of our publications on viral outbreaks, mental health and industrial biotechnology.
In order to showcase our services and promote collaboration and we are doing road shows at two other UKZN campus in July. We will be at the Westville campus (29-30 July) and at the Pietermaritzburg Campus (30-31 July).
Durban SPARK Innovation Breakfast presentation by Prof. Collen Masimirembwa, President and Chief Scientific Officer: African Institute of Biomedical Science & Technology, Tuesday, 30 July 2019(7:30am - 8:30), K-RITH building, Nelson R Mandela School of Medicine, UKZN, Durban, South Africa. All welcome!
Hackatron to code Opentrons pipetting robots for DNA amplicons and libraries for Sanger, Illumina & ONT Minion sequencing. Opentrons are open-source pipetting robots for biologists. Flexible, accessible & affordable lab robots allow life scientists to do more science & less pipetting. Programming of the robots use python language. Protocols are coded as open-source and available for the community.
Diabetes is a growing problem in South Africa, but South African Indians are at three times the risk of other race groups. What is more, Diabetes and Ischaemic Heart disease occur at least a decade younger in Indians than in other populations in South Africa. Both these diseases are the leading cause of death within the Indian population. Apart from poor diet and exercise there is a genetic component that leads to increased disease risk.
KRISP, Applied Biosystems and Thermo Fisher Scientific collaborate to bring Africa one step closer to realizing the 90-90-90 target by introducing a rapid, reliable, and cost-effective HIV-1 genotyping service in Africa. As part of the introduction, we are running a promotion of ZAR800 (US$ 55) per genotyping test (Jul-Dec 2019). Test can be done in plasma or DBS samples, turn-around time is seven working days.
KRISP, FioCruz, Brazilian Ministry of Health, the Pan American Organization and research centres from UK (Oxford, Birmingham and Edinburgh) established a network for real-time genomic surveillance.
We recently produced open access phylogenetic typing tools to classify Arboviruses, including Dengue, Zika, Chikungunya and Yellow Fever Virus. These tools are been widely used by the scientific community and were published in Science (2018) and PLoS NTD (2019).
Durban SPARK Innovation Breakfast presentation by Professor Michael Wallach, KRISP Director SPARK Sydney and Regional Director of SPARK Oceania, University of Technology Sydney (UTS), Thursday, 27 June 2019(7:30am - 8:30), K-RITH building, Nelson R Mandela School of Medicine, UKZN, Durban, South Africa. All welcome!
UKZN African Health Flagship, KRISP, DIPLOMICS & Thermo Education Program on Capillary Electrophoresis (i.e. Sanger Sequencing. . Thermo-KRISP Lab, Nelson Mandela School of Medicine, UKZN, Durban, South Africa, 27-28 June 2019. Training is open to University Post-Graduate Students & Technical Staff of Commercial and Academic laboratories. Scholarships available to previously disadvantaged South African learners.
KRISP PAPERS
Whole genome sequencing for drug-resistant tuberculosismanagement in South Africa: What gaps would this address andwhat are the challenges to implementation?.
Dlamini MT, Lessells R, Iketleng T, de Oliveira T, Journal of Clinical TB and Other Mycobacterial Dis (2019), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jctube.2019.100115:.
The clinical presentation caused by truncating CHD8 variants..
Douzgou S, Liang HW, Metcalfe K, Somarathi S, Tischkowitz M, Mohamed W, Kini U, McKee S, Yates L, Bertoli M, Lynch SA, Holder S; Deciphering Developmental Disorders Study, Banka S, Clin Genet. (2019), 96(1):72-84. doi: 10.1111/cge.13554:.
Phylodynamic analyses of Brazilian antigenic variants of infectious bursal disease virus.
de Fraga AP, Graf T, Coltro VP, Ikuta N, Fonseca ASK, Majó N, Lunge VR, Infect Genet Evol. (2019), 73:159-166. doi: 10.1016/j.meegid.2019.04.020:.
Predictors of quality of life among community psychiatric patients in a peri-urban district of Gauteng Province, South Africa..
Mapatwana D, Tomita A, Burns JK, Robertson LJ, Int J Soc Psychiatry (2019), 65(4):322-332. doi: 10.1177/0020764019842291.
Bypassing Osmotic Shock Dilemma in a Polystyrene Resin Using the Green Solvent Cyclopentyl methyl Ether (CPME): A Morphological Perspective..
Al Musaimi O, El-Faham A, Almarhoon Z, Basso A, de la Torre BG, Albericio F, Polymers (Basel) (2019), 11(5). pii: E874. doi: 10.3390/polym11050874.:.
High rate of occult hepatitis B virus infection in hemodialysis units of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa.
Msomi N, Ndlovu K, Giandhari J, Wilkinson E, Parboosing R, Zungu S, Mlisana K, J Med Virol. (2019), doi: 10.1002/jmv.25510:.
Circulation of chikungunya virus East/Central/South African lineage in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Xavier J, Giovanetti M, Fonseca V, Thézé J, Gräf T, Fabri A, Goes de Jesus J, Lima de Mendonça MC, Damasceno Dos Santos Rodrigues C, Mares-Guia MA, Cardoso Dos Santos C, Fraga de Oliveira Tosta S, Candido D, Ribeiro Nogueira RM, Luiz de Abreu A, Kleber Oliveira W, Campelo de Albuquerque CF, Chieppe A, de Oliveira T, Brasil P, Calvet G, Carvalho Sequeira P, Rodrigues Faria N, Bispo de Filippis AM, Alcantara LCJ, PLoS One (2019), 14(6):e0217871:.
KRISP VIDEOS
Human Genome, S5Ion Sequencing & Women in Science in Africa
By: Maryam Fish
KRISP TEAM
KRISP BLOGS
KRISP TOOLS
2019-02-12
REGA HIV Subtyping Tool V3 - Belgium Mirror
Phylogenetic tool to identify the HIV-1 subtypes and recombinants. Query sequences are analysed for recombination using bootscanning methods. The version 3 contains new CRFs (CRF01_AE to CRF47_BF).
2018-12-05
Booster: a new bootstrap method for construction of large trees
A new version of the phylogenetic bootstrap in which the presence of inferred branches in replications is measured using a gradual 'transfer' distance rather than the binary presence or absence index used in Felsenstein's original version. The resulting supports are higher and do not induce falsely supported branches.
2016-08-21
REGA HIV Subtyping Tool V3 - South African mirror
This tool is designed to use phylogenetic methods in order to identify the HIV-1 subtype of a specific sequence. The sequence is analysed for recombination using bootscanning methods. The version 3 contains new CRFs (CRF01_AE to CRF47_BF).
2016-08-20
This is the first version of the Zika typing tool, which uses phylogenetic analysis to identify the species and genotype of the virus.
2016-08-20
This is the first version of our Arbovirus typing tool for Chikungunya, Dengue, Yellow Fever and Zika
2016-08-20
ArboTyping: Chikungunya Typing Tool
This is the first version of the Chikungunya typing tool, which uses phylogenetic analysis to identify the species and genotype of the virus.