Dr Liz Carpenter, AgResearch, Ruakura
Roger: My guest this week is head of the Hyper Immune Milk Group at AgResearch. Dr Liz Carpenter, welcome.
Liz: Thank you for having me.
Roger: Liz, AgResearch have developed a new milk, is that right?
Liz: Well, not necessarily a new milk. What weve done is enhanced the levels of a protein called IGA in the milk, and so we have just transformed this milk to make it a more valuable product.
Roger: Whats actually happened to the milk?
Liz: Well, weve taken some cows and weve immunised them against the organism that causes oral thrush in humans theres a fungus called Candida Albicans so weve taken that fungus and weve vaccinated cows with it, and the cows have been triggered to make an immune response, in particular an antibody called IGA, and that IGA has made its way to the milk and can be collected from the milk, processed and then produced as a product that we can used for consumers to protect them from oral thrush. What we envisage is that our milk will be processed into a powder form and then put into a product perhaps a lozenge, perhaps a mouthwash. So, it wont be sitting in the supermarket alongside the calcitrim. It might be sitting in the supermarket alongside the throat lozenges or it will be in the chemist available at the counter.
Roger: How does the process work in the cow? After this injection has been administered, what happens then?
Liz: The cows respond just as we do when we are vaccinated. We have induced them to make more of a particular antibody which we call IGA, and IGA is really important to protect our mouth and our gastro-intestinal tract and also our skin all our mucosal surfaces. And so cows dont usually make much of this IGA. Theyre primed up to make a different kind of antibody but weve managed to trigger this IGA to possibly about 10 times the level that they usually make, and then we can collect that milk and use it as a prophylactic, something that you would take regularly to prevent the Candida Albicans. The IGA works a bit like rust-proof paint. It just forms a barrier on your surface, so if were talking about the oral thrush, you would have a barrier of this IGA antibody on your mucosal surfaces on your teeth, on your tongue, on the cells of your mouth. And that would just stop the Candida adhering, and then the Candida would just wash through with swallowing the saliva.
Roger: What about the cows themselves are you satisfied that this is an ethical procedure?
Liz: When we do research at AgResearch we have to have ethical approval for all of these trials. So before we even started we had to talk to the vets, we had to talk to the farmers to make sure that the vaccination that we were proposing would be acceptable to them, and also we have to make sure that the cows were not harmed in any way. So, weve studied this quite intensively over the years. We know now that the calving rate has not changed; the milk volume has not changed; the milk composition has not changed. All weve really done is enhance the levels of a natural antibody to levels that we can then collect through processing.
Roger: Is the milk produced specific to one disease or virus, or will it cover a broad range?
Liz: Not at this stage, but that is what we plan to do. There is a really huge potential there for things like SARS and Avian flu, because both of those viruses attack humans through the respiratory tract or another area would be travellers diarrhoea, where you travel overseas, and youve heard all these terrible stories of people who get travellers diarrhoea, and its through eating unwashed food, due to a bacteria that has got in through oral ingestion and into your gut. Well, I would envisage that we could make a product that could protect your gut from that bacteria.
Roger: What sort of timeframe are we looking at before I could go and buy these products?
Liz: We envisage it will be there in possibly three years. We need to get this up into commercial trials so that we can produce sufficient of the product so that we can put into lab based trials and clinical trials. Once we know how effective the product is, thats going to influence the market value.
Roger: Dr Liz Carpenter, thanks for joining us.
Liz: Thank you for having me.
Roger: Liz, AgResearch have developed a new milk, is that right?
Liz: Well, not necessarily a new milk. What weve done is enhanced the levels of a protein called IGA in the milk, and so we have just transformed this milk to make it a more valuable product.
Roger: Whats actually happened to the milk?
Liz: Well, weve taken some cows and weve immunised them against the organism that causes oral thrush in humans theres a fungus called Candida Albicans so weve taken that fungus and weve vaccinated cows with it, and the cows have been triggered to make an immune response, in particular an antibody called IGA, and that IGA has made its way to the milk and can be collected from the milk, processed and then produced as a product that we can used for consumers to protect them from oral thrush. What we envisage is that our milk will be processed into a powder form and then put into a product perhaps a lozenge, perhaps a mouthwash. So, it wont be sitting in the supermarket alongside the calcitrim. It might be sitting in the supermarket alongside the throat lozenges or it will be in the chemist available at the counter.
Roger: How does the process work in the cow? After this injection has been administered, what happens then?
Liz: The cows respond just as we do when we are vaccinated. We have induced them to make more of a particular antibody which we call IGA, and IGA is really important to protect our mouth and our gastro-intestinal tract and also our skin all our mucosal surfaces. And so cows dont usually make much of this IGA. Theyre primed up to make a different kind of antibody but weve managed to trigger this IGA to possibly about 10 times the level that they usually make, and then we can collect that milk and use it as a prophylactic, something that you would take regularly to prevent the Candida Albicans. The IGA works a bit like rust-proof paint. It just forms a barrier on your surface, so if were talking about the oral thrush, you would have a barrier of this IGA antibody on your mucosal surfaces on your teeth, on your tongue, on the cells of your mouth. And that would just stop the Candida adhering, and then the Candida would just wash through with swallowing the saliva.
Roger: What about the cows themselves are you satisfied that this is an ethical procedure?
Liz: When we do research at AgResearch we have to have ethical approval for all of these trials. So before we even started we had to talk to the vets, we had to talk to the farmers to make sure that the vaccination that we were proposing would be acceptable to them, and also we have to make sure that the cows were not harmed in any way. So, weve studied this quite intensively over the years. We know now that the calving rate has not changed; the milk volume has not changed; the milk composition has not changed. All weve really done is enhance the levels of a natural antibody to levels that we can then collect through processing.
Roger: Is the milk produced specific to one disease or virus, or will it cover a broad range?
Liz: Not at this stage, but that is what we plan to do. There is a really huge potential there for things like SARS and Avian flu, because both of those viruses attack humans through the respiratory tract or another area would be travellers diarrhoea, where you travel overseas, and youve heard all these terrible stories of people who get travellers diarrhoea, and its through eating unwashed food, due to a bacteria that has got in through oral ingestion and into your gut. Well, I would envisage that we could make a product that could protect your gut from that bacteria.
Roger: What sort of timeframe are we looking at before I could go and buy these products?
Liz: We envisage it will be there in possibly three years. We need to get this up into commercial trials so that we can produce sufficient of the product so that we can put into lab based trials and clinical trials. Once we know how effective the product is, thats going to influence the market value.
Roger: Dr Liz Carpenter, thanks for joining us.