Ian Frank Connerton

University of Nottingham | Notts · Division of Microbiology Brewing & Biotechnology

Bio-Based Antimicrobial Agents to Improve Agricultural and Food Safety provides a comprehensive overview of the latest advancements in bio-based antimicrobial agents used to enhance food safety and agricultural production. This book highlights natural alternatives to chemical preservatives, focusing on surfactin, bacillomycin, fengycin, bacteriocin...

Chicken meat is contaminated with Salmonella from the gut of infected chickens during slaughter. Eradication of Salmonella from broiler chickens through hygiene measures and/or vaccination is not cost-effective; complementary approaches are required. A mature gut microbiota obstructs Salmonella infection in chickens, and deliberate fortification of...

Abstract Probiotics, including Lactic Acid Bacteria (LAB), have gained considerable attention due to their potential health benefits for humans and animal livestock. This research aimed to isolate probiotic bacteria of human origin and explore their therapeutic potential against Campylobacter strains, which are recognized as the leading bacterial...

The application of bacteriophages to control foodborne bacterial pathogens in foods has gained traction in recent years. Poultry meat is a major source of Campylobacter jejuni, and a target for the application of bacteriophages. To offer the prospect of a post-harvest control measure, the bacteriophage must function at refrigeration temperatures, w...

Background Chicken meat can be contaminated with Salmonella originating from the gastrointestinal tract of infected chickens during slaughter. Total eradication of Salmonella from flocks of broiler (meat) chickens through hygiene measures and/or vaccination regimes is not deemed cost-effective, so complementary approaches are sought. A mature gut m...

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Introduction Rotavirus A is a major cause of acute dehydrating diarrhea in neonatal pigs resulting in significant mortality, morbidity, reduced performance and economic loss. Commercially available prebiotic galacto-oligosaccharides are similar to those of mammalian milk and stimulate the development of the microbiota and immune system in neonates....

Poorly performing piglets receiving commercial milk replacers do not benefit from the naturally occurring probiotic galacto-oligosaccharides otherwise found in sow milk. Study objectives were to investigate the effects of complete milk replacer supplemented with galacto-oligosaccharides on the microbiome, gut architecture and immunomodulatory goble...

Background: Suckling is a unique period in porcine development where establishment of the microbiota is essential for future growth and health of animals. However, poor pre-weaning performance and failure to thrive without signs of clinical disease during lactation is of concern in pig production and incurs significant economic loss. Prebiotic gala...

The primary objective of this study was to investigate if common colonic community indicators could be identified from the microbiota of 22-day-old suckling pigs in repeated small-scale trials. Three separate trials were conducted at different times in the same year and facility with genetically similar animals. Colonic samples were collected from...

A novel Gram-stain negative, aerobic, halotolerant, motile, rod-shaped, predatory bacterium ASxL5 T , was isolated from a bovine slurry tank in Nottinghamshire, UK using Campylobacter hyointestinalis as prey. Other Campylobacter species and members of the Enterobacteriaceae were subsequently found to serve as prey. Weak axenic growth on Brain Heart...

Campylobacteriosis is the most commonly reported gastrointestinal disease in humans. Campybacter jejuni is the main cause of the infection, and bacterial colonization in broiler chickens is widespread and difficult to prevent, leading to high risk of occurrence in broiler meat. Phage therapy represents an alternative strategy to control Campylobact...

Salmonella is one of the most common foodborne pathogens around the world. Phages are envisioned as a new strategy to control foodborne pathogenic bacteria and food safety. A Salmonella specific lytic phage vB_SalS-LPSTLL (LPSTLL) was selected for food applications on the basis of lytic range, lytic efficiency, functional stability and characterist...

Hospital food safety is of paramount importance as patients are vulnerable to acquired diseases transmitted by unsafe food. The focus of this research was to critically analyze food safety and hygiene knowledge in Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) in respect of compliance with Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) and International Organi...

Welcome to Applied Microbiology, a new Open Access MDPI journal that will report original studies and reviews on the growing numbers of applications for microorganisms and their associated technologies [...]

The synthesis of plantaricin in Lactobacillus plantarum is regulated by quorum sensing. However, the nature of the extra‐cytoplasmic (EC) sensing domain of the histidine kinase (PlnB1) and the ability to recognize the auto‐inducing peptide PlnA1 is not known. We demonstrate the key motif Ile‐Ser‐Met‐Leu of auto‐inducing peptide PlnA1 binds to the h...

Phage therapy is an alternative treatment to antibiotics that can overcome multi-drug resistant bacteria. In this study, we aimed to isolate and characterize lytic bacteriophages targeted against Enterococcus faecalis isolated from root canal infections obtained from clinics at the Faculty of Dentistry, Ismalia, Egypt. Bacteriophage, vB_ZEFP, was i...

A novel Gram-stain negative, aerobic, halotolerant, motile, rod-shaped, predatory bacterium ASxL5, was isolated from a bovine slurry tank in Nottinghamshire, UK using Campylobacter hyointestinalis as prey. Other Campylobacter species and members of the Enterobacteriaceae were subsequently found to serve as prey. Weak axenic growth on Brain Heart In...

Background: We have previously isolated Bacillus subtilis HMNig-2 and MENO2 strains, from honey and the honeybee gut microbiome respectively, and demonstrated these strains to produce levansucrase with potential probiotics characteristics. Here we report their complete genome sequence and comparative analysis with other and other B. subtilis strai...

We investigate recent advances in the Chemical Engineering aspects of food structuring agents and macronutrients: carbohydrates, proteins and lipids, and also the fate of food upon ingestion. Prebiotic effects on host-microbe interactions enable improved immune response and pathogen control. Formulation Engineering is an emerging area in the field...

Background: Lytic bacteriophages that infect Campylobacter spp. have been utilized to develop therapeutic/decontamination techniques. However, the association of Campylobacter spp. and bacteriophages has been the focus of several strands of research aimed at understanding the complex relationships that have developed between predators and prey ove...

Prebiotic oligosaccharides are widely used as human and animal feed additives for their beneficial effects on the gut microbiota. However, there are limited data to assess the direct effect of such functional foods on the transcriptome of intestinal epithelial cells. The purpose of this study is to describe the differential transcriptomes and cellu...

This study describes the development and use of bacteriophage cocktails to control Campylobacter in broiler chickens, in a commercial setting, in Queensland Australia, following the birds from farm to the processing plant. The components of the bacteriophage cocktails were selected to be effective against the maximum number of Campylobacter jejuni...

Developing novel antimicrobials capable of controlling multidrug-resistant bacterial pathogens is essential to restrict the use of antibiotics. Bacteriophages (phages) constitute a major resource that can be harnessed as an alternative to traditional antimicrobial therapies. Phage ZCSE2 was isolated among several others from raw sewage but was dist...

Campylobacter is a leading cause of foodborne illnesses both in Australia and internationally, and is frequently found in poultry. There is a need for sustainable options to support current farm management strategies that address food-safety. The use of bacteriophages provides a safe biocontrol option. A collaborative study by the Department of Agr...

Prebiotic oligosaccharides are widely used as human and animal feed additives for their beneficial effects on the gut microbiota. However, there are limited data to assess the direct effect of such functional foods on the transcriptome of intestinal epithelial cells. The purpose of this study is to describe the differential transcriptomes and cellu...

Salmonella is a leading cause of foodborne diseases, and in recent years, many isolates have exhibited a high level of antibiotic resistance, which has led to huge pressures on public health. Phages are a promising strategy to control food-borne pathogens. In this study, one of our environmental phage isolates, LPSEYT, was to be able to restrict th...

With increasing levels of antibiotic resistance, the development of alternative antibacterial therapies is urgently needed. Two potential alternatives are bacteriophage and predatory bacteria. Bacteriophage therapy has been used, but prey/host specificity and the rapid acquisition of bacterial resistance to bacteriophage are practical consideration...

Bacteriophages are a sustainable alternative to control pathogenic bacteria in the post-antibiotic era. Despite promising reports, there are still obstacles to phage use, notably titer stability and transport-associated expenses for applications in food and agriculture. In this study, we have developed a lyophilization approach to maintain phage ti...

Improvements in growth performance and health are key goals in broiler chicken production. Inclusion of prebiotic galacto-oligosaccharides (GOS) in broiler feed enhanced the growth rate and feed conversion of chickens relative to those obtained with a calorie-matched control diet. Comparison of the cecal microbiota identified key differences in abu...

Worldwide Campylobacter jejuni is a leading cause of foodborne disease. Contamination of chicken meat with digesta from C. jejuni-positive birds during slaughter and processing is a key route of transmission to humans through the food chain. Colonization of chickens with C. jejuni elicits host innate immune responses that may be modulated by dietar...

This poster describes an experiment in which crossbred dairy bull calves were allocated according to breed (Holstein Friesian and Jersey Friesian crossbred) and live weight (50 kg and below 50 kg) at 7 to 10 d of age and feed intake, growth rate and time to achieve 120 kg live weight were compared.

Bacteriophages have key roles in regulating bacterial populations in most habitats. A Salmonella Typhimurium mutant (N18) with impaired sensitivity to phage fmb-p1 was obtained and examined, the adsorption efficiency of fmb-p1 to N18 was reduced to 6%, compared to more than 97% for wild type S. Typhimurium CMCC50115. Reduced adsorption was accompan...

Bacteriophages can be used successfully to treat pathogenic bacteria in the food chain including zoonotic pathogens that colonize the intestines of farm animals. However, harsh gastric conditions of low pH and digestive enzyme activities affect phage viability, and accordingly reduce their effectiveness. We report the development of a natural prote...

Improvements in growth performance and health are key goals in broiler chicken production. Inclusion of prebiotic galacto-oligosaccharides in broiler feed enhanced the growth rate and feed conversion of chickens relative to a calorie-matched control diet. Comparison of the cecal microbiota identified key differences in abundance of Lactobacillus sp...

Effect of breed and peri-natal live weight on pre-weaning live weight gain and time to marketing to finisher weight of cross bred spring born dairy bull calves Marion Sorely, Jean Margerison, Ian Connerton, Phil Garnsworthy, Neil Saunders and Jennifer Goodman The dairy and veal sectors are closely linked, because many veal calves are the surplus...

Bacteriophage biocontrol to reduce Campylobacter jejuni levels in chickens can reduce human exposure and disease acquired through the consumption of contaminated poultry products. Investigating changes in the chicken microbiota during phage treatment has not previously been undertaken but is crucial to understanding the system-wide effects of such...

Rarefaction curves indicating coverage of Campylobacter-colonized (experimental) cecal bacterial communities. 16S rDNA bacterial communities from: (A) 1 day post-treatment (dpt); (B) 2 dpt; (C) 3 dpt; (D) 4 dpt; (E) 5 dpt. Cohort: (i) Group Cj (ii) Group Cj_phg.

Campylobacter phage titers in the ileum and colon post-treatment. Phage tiers were determined for CP20 (A) and CP30A phage (B) from ileal content and colon content (C), CP20; (D), CP30A). Filled squares indicate mean. Error bars indicate standard deviation.

Gut bacterial taxa responsive to Campylobacter-colonization at 5 days post-treatment. OTUs were filtered as described for Supplementary Figure S7 and discriminatory OTUs identified using LEfSE. LDA refers to Linear Discriminant Analysis. Control-Group Cj comparison (A), Control-Group Cj_phg comparison (B).

Description of phyla associated with no template controls. Due to potential for low biomass and dominant contaminant profile from ileum samples the kitome microbiota profile is included. Table text in parenthesis indicates Mothur taxonomy bootstrap values. Samples: kitome for all samples, excluding 1 dpt (kit Ai and kit Aii); kitome for 1 dpt (kit...

Cecal bacterial taxa responsive to Campylobacter-phage treatment. OTUs were filtered to only include those representing at least 1% of the total reads before all communities were randomly subsampled an equal depth for unbiased comparison. Discriminatory OTUs were then described between age-matched groups using LEfSE. LDA refers to Linear Discrimina...

Description of top 10 OTU associated with no template controls. Table text in parenthesis indicates Mothur taxonomy bootstrap values.

Rarefaction curves indicating coverage of Campylobacter-free non-colonized (control) cecal bacterial communities. 16S rDNA bacterial communities from Campylobacter-free non-colonized control birds at 29 days-old, equivalent to 5 days post-treatment.

Rarefaction curves indicating coverage of ileal bacterial communities. 16S rDNA bacterial community from: (A) 2 day post-treatment (dpt); (B) 3 dpt; (C) 4 dpt; (D) 5 dpt. The non-phage treated cohort (Group Cj) are shown in panels Ai to Di, and the phage treated cohort (Group Cj_phg) in panels Aii to Dii.

Stacked barchart showing phyla-level microbiota composition for ileal and cecal communities. OTUs were filtered so that only Phyla present in more than one ileal or cecal community are included in the analysis. Figures in parenthesis in the key indicate bootstrap values for that taxonomic assignment generated in Mothur. All taxa shown in the key we...

Relationship between communties of gut bacteria from phage-treated and mock-treated birds. PCoA plot of Bray-Curtis distance between A) ileal (R2 = 0.41; A,B) cecal communities (R2 = 0.75; B).

Corruption is a relatively neglected topic in studies of regulatory agencies. The label is applied to a wide range of deviations from behavioral standards ultimately derived from Weber's account of the ideals of Prussian bureaucracy. This paper draws on a study of the work of Saudi Food Inspectors to argue that it is unhelpful to reduce a complex p...

The recorded growth in infection by multidrug resistant bacteria necessitates prompt efforts toward developing alternatives to antibiotics, such as bacteriophage therapy. Immuno-compromised patients with diabetes mellitus are particularly prone to foot infections by multidrug resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae, which may be compounded by chronic osteo...

Background: Campylobacters are an unwelcome member of the poultry gut microbiota in terms of food safety. The objective of this study was to compare the microbiota, inflammatory responses, and zootechnical parameters of broiler chickens not exposed to Campylobacter jejuni with those exposed either early at 6 days old or at the age commercial broil...

Campylobacter enteritis is not a new disease, but in the 21st century, it presents serious challenges to poultry producers, food processors, and food retailers. Campylobacter jejuni and, to a lesser extent, Campylobacter coli are very frequent causes of human enteritis throughout the world. This level of infection is accompanied by high economic co...

Campylobacter contaminated poultry meat is a major source of human foodborne illness. Campylobacter coli strain OR12 is a robust colonizer of chickens that was previously shown to outcompete and displace other Campylobacter strains from the chicken’s gastrointestinal tract. This strain is capable of aerobic growth on blood agar. Serial aerobic pass...

A screen of bacteriophages infecting a panel of Campylobacter jejuni PT14 gene knock-out mutants identified a role for the minor flagellin encoded by the flaB gene, in the defense of the host against CP8unalikevirus bacteriophage CP_F1 infection. Inactivation of the flaB gene resulted in an increase in the susceptibility of PT14 cultures to infecti...

Consumption of foods containing chicken liver has been associated with Campylobacter enteritis. Campylobacters can contaminate the surface of livers post-mortem but can also arise through systemic infection of colonising bacteria in live birds. The use of bacteriophage to reduce levels of Campylobacter entering the food chain is a promising interve...

Starches from three organically produced cultivars of potato tuber (Lady Rosetta, Spunta and Voyager) have been studied in relation to (i) acrylamide production (ii) macromolecular integrity after frying with extra virgin olive oil, soybean oil and corn oil. During cultivation, a treatment involving the combination of nitrogen, phosphorus and potas...

Microbial attacks during storage are one of the primary causes of product deterioration, and can limit the process of prolonging the shelf-life of harvested food. In this study, sweet potatoes were stored at temperatures of 13, 21, and 29 °C for 4 weeks. Samples were collected during storage and plated on potato dextrose agar, from which axenic mol...

Incorporation of self-derived CRISPR DNA protospacers in Campylobacter jejuni PT14 occurs in the presence of bacteriophages encoding a CRISPR-like Cas4 protein. This phenomenon was evident in carrier state infections where both bacteriophages and host are maintained for seemingly indefinite periods as stable populations following serial passage. Ca...

Phase-variable restriction-modification systems are a feature of a diverse range of bacterial species. Stochastic, reversible switches in expression of the methyltransferase produces variation in methylation of specific sequences. Phase-variable methylation by both Type I and Type III methyltransferases is associated with altered gene expression an...

Objective To provide stable anaesthesia of long duration in broiler chickens in order to perform a terminal caecal ligated loop procedure.Study designProspective experimental study.AnimalsSeven clinically healthy broiler chickens (Gallus domesticus) aged 27–36 days, weighing 884–2000 g.Methods Anaesthesia was induced and maintained with isoflurane...

The transition from rod to filamentous cell morphology has been identified as a response to stressful conditions in many bacterial species and has been ascribed to confer certain survival advantages. Filamentation of Campylobacter jejuni was demonstrated to occur spontaneously on entry in to stationary phase distinguishing it from many other bacter...