BCFPA 2020 Annual General Meeting

BCFPA 2020 Virtual Annual General Meeting

Date: January 28, 2021

Location: Zoom (Virtual)

Visit our website to register and for more information https://www.bcfoodprotection.ca

Register today to attend our AGM!

Attendance is FREE for BCFPA Members who renewed for 2021 and for members from 2020!

Register here: https://www.bcfoodprotection.ca/event-4103774

Event schedule and speaker bio: click here

We highly encourage you to register, come and participate at our AGM. We will have one student speaker, opportunities to network and catch up with your fellow BCFPA colleagues through a fun and interactive virtual networking activity, and listen to your BCFPA board members as they go through the 2020 AGM Report.

We will also be announcing the 2020 BCFPA Scholarship Award recipients.

We are accepting nominations to run in our 2021 Executive Board. If you are interested in volunteering, please talk to us in person or send us an email! We are always looking for volunteers!

Schedule:

4:30-4:45 PM Welcome Remarks, AGM Business & Scholarship Award Announcement
4:45-5:15 PM Virtual Networking Activity
5:20-5:50 PM Speaker: Tom Brenner, UBC PhD Candidate, on "Formulating a broad-spectrum bacteriophage cocktail against pervasive poultry-associated Salmonella enterica serovars"
5:50-6:00 PM Closing Remarks

Thomas Brenner
PhD Candidate, Food Science, Faculty of Land and Food Systems, University of British Columbia

Tom previously did his Bachelor of Science (BSc) with a minor in chemistry and Master's of Science (MSc) Integrative Biology at Wilfrid Laurier University in Waterloo, Ontario. After his Master's degree, he was employed as Project Manager/Research Associate under the Canadian Glycomics Network and Salmonella Syst-OMICS where he investigated novel treatments for oral pathogens in ‘The Red Complex’ and bacteriophages for disrupting Salmonella biofilms. Tom now investigates antimicrobial applications of bacteriophages in the poultry industry for his PhD research. His goal is to produce economically feasible and safe alternative antimicrobials for use in Canadian agriculture.

Topic: Formulating a broad-spectrum bacteriophage cocktail against pervasive poultry-associated Salmonella enterica serovars

Summary:
Illness caused by Salmonella, known as salmonellosis, is primarily linked to the consumption of poultry products with annual fiscal losses in North America estimated in the billions of dollars. However, excessive antibiotic usage in agriculture has been linked to increased antimicrobial resistance to important human antibiotics which has resulted in complete and partial bans of antibiotics in livestock feed in Europe and North America, respectively. Bacteriophages are natural bacterial predators which have shown promise as alternative antimicrobials due to their safety, ubiquity, and target specificity. The purpose of my research has been to formulate a phage cocktail with antimicrobial efficacy across poultry-associated Salmonella isolates. A broad-spectrum cocktail containing three sewage phages has been successfully produced with high killing efficacy across all tested poultry-associated Salmonella isolates in vitro. This research may prove valuable in food industries where antibiotic treatments are being progressively limited as antimicrobial options.