Auriol Purdie nee Williams
editAuriol Purdie nee Williams (21-03-1974) was born in Cape Town, South Africa and spent formative years in Scotland, India and the UK. Purdie undertook her undergraduate degree in Molecular Genetics at Kings College in London followed by a MSc at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine in the immunology of infectious disease, and a PhD looking at the immunomodulatory effects of macrolide and fluoroquinolone antibiotics.
Research
Growing up in many diverse environments and exposed to many wonderful teachers throughout school resulted in a fascination for biological sciences, but her PhD crystallised Purdie’s fascination into a desire to understand the mechanisms driving the response to infection and the pathogenesis of disease. Purdie’s PhD studies revealed normal doses of some commonly used antibiotics are able to cause significant changes to a human’s natural immune response to bacterial infection which can potentially have either a positive or a negative outcome for the patient, dependant on the antibiotic (references 1,2,3,4,5). The ability to utilise an antibiotic to potentially alter the immune response within a patient so that the immune response is better able to fight infection is something that is increasingly being studied with the advent of antibiotic resistant bacteria and the lack of discovery of novel antibiotics to replace those that are no longer effective. Purdie’s PhD was funded by Bayer pharmaceuticals. Purdie’s first post doctoral position was in a Medical Research Council (UK) funded project at the Roslin Institute, Scotland in a project to identify genetic markers of pathogenesis for the disease Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (mad cow disease or BSE), which was a massive international crisis given occurrence of cases of the human equivalent (Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease) triggered by ingestion of BSE contaminated meat products. Purdie looked for and identified early markers of pathogenesis in both cattle and mouse models of the disease by evaluation of the pre-clinical stages of the disease through the use of gene array (microarray) technology and other genomic techniques (these data were presented at scientific conferences and further work is being carried out to confirm the findings for use in diagnostics). All of this was done under commercial wraps, a huge hidden effort with potential career limiting impact for a young scientist in need of publications. Purdie followed this important work at the Roslin Institute in a second post doctoral appointment to develop and research the manufacture of therapeutic proteins from the eggs of transgenic chickens, which began with developing procedures to enable such novel work (reference 6).
Purdie came to Australia, to join a team at the University of Sydney, specifically to manage animal genomics in a very large study of paratuberculosis, a disease of ruminants with zoonotic overtones. Purdie’s work within a large multi-faceted team is closely linked to industry outcomes, drawing on basic science, and requiring development of new methodologies. This theme of pushing genomic methodologies out of their comfort zone in the resource-rich realm around humans, cattle and mice has characterised much of Purdie’s career. The scientific output has been prodigious, with post graduate students benefiting enormously from Purdie’s diverse experience across animal and veterinary science at the interface between immunology and genomics. Key discoveries have been in-silico prediction of antigens for diagnostic test development, modulation of components of the antigen presenting pathway (MHC) during development of paratuberculosis and insights into the involvement of the cholesterol pathway in the pathogenesis of paratuberculosis (references7-24).
Publications
1. Williams, A. C., H. F. Galley, et al. (2001). "The effect of moxifloxacin of interleukin-8 release from human neutrophils" British Journal of Anaesthesia; 87: 671P.
2. Williams, A. C., H. F. Galley, et al. (2002). "Quinolone antibiotics have selective effects on polymorphonuclear leukocyte function." Clinical Microbiological Infection; 8(Supplement 1): P769
3. Williams, A. C., H. F. Galley, et al. (2003). "Ciprofloxacin, moxifloxacin and clarithromycin alter Th cell interferon gamma and interleukin-4 expression." Clinical Microbiological Infection; 9 (Supplement 1): P689.
4. Williams, A. C., H. F. Galley, et al. (2003). "Ciprofloxacin, moxifloxacin and clarithromycin alter IFNγ and IL-4 expression in Th cells." Scottish Medical Journal; 48(4): 130.
5. Williams, A. C., H. F. Galley, et al. (2005). "Differential effects of three antibiotics on T helper cell cytokine expression" Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy; 56(3): 502-506.
6. Lyall, J., Irvine, R.M., Sherman, A., Mckinley, T.J., Nunez, A. Purdie, A., Tiley, L. et al (2011) “Supression of Avian Influenza Transmission in Genetically Modified Chickens” Science; 331: 223-226.
7. Plain, K, Purdie (Williams), A C, Begg, D J, de Silva, K I, Whittington, R 2010, Toll-like receptor (TLR)6 and TLR1 differentiation in gene expression studies of Johne's disease, Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 137(1-2), 142-148.
8. Purdie (Williams), A C, Plain, K, Begg, D J, de Silva, K I, Whittington, R 2011, Candidate gene and genome-wide association studies of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis infection in cattle and sheep: A review, Comparative Immunology, Microbiology and Infectious Diseases: the international journal for medical and veterinary researchers and practitioners, 34(3), 197-208.
9. Begg, D J, de Silva, K I, Carter, N M, Plain, K, Purdie (Williams), A C, Whittington, R 2011, Does a Th1 over Th2 dominancy really exist in the early stages of Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis infections?, Immunobiology, 216(7), 840-846.
10. Plain, K, de Silva, K I, Earl, J, Begg, D J, Purdie (Williams), A C, Whittington, R 2011, Indoleamine 2,3-Dioxygenase, Tryptophan Catabolism, and Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis: a model for Chronic Mycobacterial Infection, Infection and Immunity, 79(9), 3821-3832.
11. Whittington, R, Begg, D J, de Silva, K I, Plain, K, Purdie (Williams), A C 2012, Comparative immunological and microbiological aspects of paratuberculosis as a model mycobacterial infection, Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 148(1-2), 29-47.
12. Plain, K, Begg, D J, de Silva, K I, Purdie (Williams), A C, Whittington, R 2012, Enhancement of the interferon gamma assay to detect paratuberculosis using interleukin-7 and interleukin-12 potentiation, Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 149(1-2), 28-37.
13. Purdie (Williams), A C, Plain, K, Begg, D J, de Silva, K I, Whittington, R 2012, Expression of genes associated with the antigen presentation and processing pathway are consistently regulated in early Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis infection, Comparative Immunology, Microbiology and Infectious Diseases: the international journal for medical and veterinary researchers and practitioners, 35(2), 151-162.
14. Gurung, R, Purdie (Williams), A C, Begg, D J, Whittington, R 2012, In silico identification of epitopes in Mycobacterium avium subsp paratuberculosis proteins that were upregulated under stress conditions, Clinical and Vaccine Immunology, 19(6), 855-864.
15. Gurung, R, Purdie (Williams), A C, Begg, D J, Whittington, R 2012, In silico screened Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis (MAP) recombinant proteins upregulated under stress conditions are immunogenic in sheep, Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 149(3-4), 186-196.
16. Gurung, R, Begg, D J, Purdie (Williams), A C, Bannantine, J, Whittington, R 2013, Antigenicity of Recombinant Maltose Binding Protein-Mycobacterium avium subsp. Paratuberculosis Fusion Proteins with and without Factor Xa Cleaving, Clinical and Vaccine Immunology, 20(12), 1817-1826.
17. de Silva, K I, Begg, D J, Plain, K, Purdie (Williams), A C, Kawaji, S, Dhand, N K, Whittington, R 2013, Can early host responses to mycobacterial infection predict eventual disease outcomes?, Preventive Veterinary Medicine, 112, 203-212.
18. Whittington, R, Whittington, A, Waldron, A M, Begg, D J, de Silva, K I, Purdie (Williams), A C, Plain, K 2013, Development and validation of a liquid medium (M7H9C) for routine culture of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis to replace modified Bactec 12B medium, Journal of Clinical Microbiology, 51(12), 3993-4000.
19. Gurung, R, Begg, D J, Purdie (Williams), A C, Whittington, R 2014, Antigenicity in sheep of synthetic peptides derived from stress-regulated Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis proteins and comparison with recombinant protein and complex native antigens, Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 158(1-2), 46-52.
20. Gurung, R, Purdie (Williams), A C, Whittington, R, Begg, D J 2014, Cellular and humoral immune responses in sheep vaccinated with candidate antigens MAP2698c and MAP3567 from Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis, Frontiers in Cellular and Infection Microbiology, 14(Article 93), 1-8.
21. Thirunavukkarasu, S, Plain, K, de Silva, K I, Begg, D J, Whittington, R, Purdie (Williams), A C 2014, Expression of genes associated with cholesterol and lipid metabolism identified as a novel pathway in the early pathogenesis of Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis - infection in cattle, Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 160(3-4), 147-157.
22. Plain, K, Marsh, I, Waldron, A M, Galea, F, Whittington, A, Saunders, V, Begg, D J, de Silva, K I, Purdie (Williams), A C, Whittington, R 2014, High-Throughput Direct Faecal PCR Assay to detect Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis in sheep and cattle, Journal of Clinical Microbiology, 52(3), 745-757.
23. Gurung, R, Begg, D J, Purdie (Williams), A C, Bach, H, Whittington, R 2014, Immunoreactivity of protein tyrosine phosphatase A (PtpA) in sera from sheep infected with Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis, Veterinary Immunology and Immunopathology, 160, 129-132.
24. Gurung, R, Begg, D J, Purdie (Williams), A C, de Silva, K I, Bannantine, J, Whittington, R 2014, Lymphoproliferative and IFN-y responses to stress-regulated Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis recombinant proteins, Clinical and Vaccine Immunology, 21(6), 831-837.