Professor Jeremy Dale

Research Interests

Mycobacterial survival within protozoa

We have shown that Mycobacterium bovis survives ingestion by amoebae. This can potentially provide a privileged niche in which the bacteria are protected from harmful agents and conditions including desiccation, UV radiation, and disinfectants. We are working to establish how significant this effect might be in promoting the spread of bovine tuberculosis.

We have also shown that, in contrast to virulent M. bovis, the attenuated vaccine strain BCG is killed following ingestion by amoebae. If similar effects occur in macrophages, then establishing the genetic basis for this effect will indicate possible reasons for the attenuation of BCG, which will be of benefit for the development of new vaccines.

References

Rhodes, S. G., De Leij, F. A. A. M. and Dale, J. W. (2007) Protozoa as an environmental reservoir of bovine tuberculosis. Trends Microbiol., 15, 338-339.

Taylor, S.J., Ahonen, L.J., de Leij, F.A.A.M., & Dale, J.W. (2003). Infection of Acanthamoeba castellanii with Mycobacterium bovis and M. bovis BCG and survival of M. bovis within the amoebae. Appl Environ Microbiol 69, 4316-4319.

Publications

Books include:

Understanding Microbes: An Introduction to a Small World. See www.wiley.com/buy/978-1-1199-7879-4

Published January 2013

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Molecular Genetics of Bacteria (with Simon Park)

5th edition, 2010. Published by John Wiley.

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 From Genes to Genomes (with Malcolm von Schantz). 

3rd edition, 2012. Published by John Wiley

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Mycobacteria: Molecular Biology and Virulence. Ratledge, C. & Dale, J.W. (eds). (1999). 

Published by Blackwell Science, Oxford

Selected research publications

Hoettges, K. F., Dale, J. W. and Hughes, M. P. (2007) Rapid determination of antibiotic resistance in E. coli using dielectrophoresis. Physics in Medicine and Biology, 52, 6001-6009.

Shelley G. Rhodes, Frans, A. A. M. DeLeij and Jeremy W. Dale (2007). Protozoa as an environmental reservoir of bovine tuberculosis . Trends in Microbiology, 15, 338-339

European Concerted Action on New Generation Genetic Markers and Techniques for the Epidemiology and Control of Tuberculosis (2006). Worldwide distribution of Beijing/W genotype Mycobacterium tuberculosis and associations with drug resistance: a collaborative study in 35 countries. Emerging Infectious Diseases, 12, 736-743

Hasan Yesilkaya, Ken J. Forbes, Jamila Shafi, Rebecca Smith, Jeremy W. Dale, Kumar Rajakumar, Michael R. Barer and Peter W. Andrew (2006). The genetic portrait of an outbreak strain. Tuberculosis, 86, 357-362

Hasan Yesilkaya, Jeremy W. Dale, Norval J.C.Strachan and Ken J. Forbes. (2005). Natural transposon mutagenesis of clinical isolates of Mycobacterium tuberculosis: how many genes does a pathogen need? J Bact, 187, 6726-6732

Dale, J.W., Bothamley, G.H., Drobniewski, F., Gillespie, S.H., McHugh, T.D. & Pitman, R. (2005) Origins and properties of Mycobacterium tuberculosis isolates in London. J Med Microbiol 54, 575-582.

A. Rozkov, C.A. Avignone-Rossa, P.F. Ertl, P. Jones, R.D. O’Kennedy, J.J. Smith, J.W. Dale, M.E. Bushell. (2004). Characterization of the metabolic burden on Escherichia coli DH1 cells imposed by the presence of a plasmid containing a gene therapy sequence. Biotechnology & Bioengineering 88, 910-915

Jeremy W. Dale, Hasan Al-Ghusein, Salim Al-Hashmi, Philip Butcher, Anne L. Dickens, Francis Drobniewski, Ken Forbes, Stephen H. Gillespie, Dianie Lamprecht, Timothy D. McHugh, Richard Pitman, Nalin Rastogi, Andrew T. Smith, Christophe Sola, Hasan Yesilkaya (2003). Evolutionary relationships amongst strains of Mycobacterium tuberculosis with few copies of IS6110. J Bact 185, 2555-2562

I. Filliol, J. R. Driscoll, D. van Soolingen, B. N. Kreiswirth, K. Kremer, G. Valétudie, D. Duc Anh, R. Barlow, D. Banerjee, P. J. Bifani, K. Brudey, A. Cataldi, R. C. Cooksey, D. V. Cousins, J W. Dale, O. A. Dellagostin, F. Drobniewski, G. Engelmann, S. Ferdinand, D. Gascoyne-Binzi, M. Gordon, M. C. Gutierrez, W. H. Haas, H. Heersma, E. Kassa-Kelembho, H. Minh Ly, A. Makristathis, C. Mammina, G. Martin, P. Moström, I. Mokrousov, V. Narbonne, O. Narvskaya, A. Nastasi, S. Ngo Niobe-Eyangoh, J. W. Pape, V. Rasolofo-Razanamparany, M. Ridell, M. Lucia Rossetti, F. Stauffer, P. N. Suffys, H. Takiff, J. Texier-Maugein, V. Vincent, J. H. de Waard, C. Sola*, and N. Rastogi*. (2003). Snapshot of Moving and Expanding Clones of Mycobacterium tuberculosis and their Global Distribution Assessed by Spoligotyping In An International Study J. Clin. Microbiol. 41 :1963-1970.

Hasan Yesilkaya, Anne Thomson, Christine Doig, Brian Watt, Jeremy W. Dale and Ken J. Forbes. (2003). Locating transposable element polymorphisms in bacterial genomes. Journal of Microbiological Methods. 53, 355-363

Stephanie J. Taylor, Frans A.A.M. de Leij, and Jeremy W. Dale (2003). Infection of Acanthamoeba castellanii with Mycobacterium bovis and M. bovis BCG and survival of M. bovis within the amoebae. Appl Env Microbiol. 69, 4316-4319

MSc programmes in Medical Microbiology

For information on our MSc programmes in Medical Microbiology (part-time and full-time), click here.