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Otago Medical School senior lecturer Dr Ivan Sammut is involved in researching new red-blood-cell toxins to kill rats and mice. Photo supplied. |
Having one centre co-ordinating wildlife management and
conservation should enable new ideas for pest management to
become a reality more quickly, Otago researcher Dr Ivan
Sammut says.
Dr Sammut is one of a group of Otago researchers, including
pharmacologists and chemists, working on new toxins to
control rats and mice, a project that comes under the
umbrella of the Centre for Wildlife Management and
Conservation at Lincoln University, which was officially
opened yesterday.
The centre will focus research efforts on delivering a range
of "next-generation tools" to protect native animals and
plants from mammalian pests and improve ways to conserve
threatened species, and better equipping people to deliver
and use the tools.
Centre director Prof Charles Eason said it had been 30 years
since a new toxin for rat and mouse control had been
developed.
What the team from the University of Otago Medical School and
Auckland University were doing to develop a new toxin was a
huge challenge and would have "huge international
significance", he said.
It was a two-pronged study that would have clinical benefits
for humans as well as providing another option for pest
control.
"It's an exciting area of fundamental research."
The programme at the centre had been set up to bridge the gap
between research and commercialisation, Dr Eason said.
Dr Sammut, a medical school senior lecturer in cardiovascular
pharmacology, said the research involved rapidly decreasing
oxygenation in the blood, providing a quick and more humane
way to kill that did not leave any residue.
The work done by the centre would make it much easier to
drive new initiatives by providing the expertise to patent
ideas and set up trials, he said.
Dr Eason said that at the other end of the research scale was
the PAP (para-aminopropiophenone) virus, which was launched
at the opening yesterday. It was a humane toxin that killed
stoats quickly. However, it was not toxic to rodents.
rebecca.fox@odt.co.nz
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