Dear all,

As you know, the International Brucellosis Society awarded two poster prizes to early stage scientists. These were announced at the end of the meeting, but many of you (including the two winners) had already left to catch their planes so I would like to take this opportunity to tell you all who won, and to congratulate them in person.

The evaluation committee first selected a best poster for each session (all authors included).  These were:

Taxonomy, Evolution, Emerging Species

Alina Kühn – Identification of atypical Brucella spp. by MALDI ToF MS

Genomics and Proteomics

Adélie Lannoy – Envelope stress response in Brucella abortus

Pathogenesis and Host-Pathogens Interaction

Amaia Zúñiga-Ripa – Suppression of B. melitensis Rev1 erythritol catabolism as a strategy to avoid genital tropism to develop a safe brucellosis vaccine

Vaccination

Raquel Conde-Alvarez – Development of a B. melitensis Rev1 mutant lacking streptomycin resistance

Diagnostics

Loic Comtet – Evaluation of a new double-antigen indirect ELISA using a rough-LPS extract from B. ovis for the diagnosis of porcine brucellosis

Human Brucellosis

Mizanur Rahman – Prevalence and risk factors of brucellosis in lactating cow and its public health importance in military dairy farms of Bangladesh

Epidemiology Control and Eradication

Anna Haughey – Brucella canis in Great Britain: Cases, Case Definitions, Management and Control

Wildlife brucellosis

Luis Samartino – Antibody detection in heifers challenged with local strains of Brucella suis biovar 1 previously isolated from Armadilo ( Chaetophractus villosus ) and Hares ( Lepus europaeus )

The two poster prizes were awarded to:

Pathogenesis and Host-Pathogens Interaction

Aitor Elizalde-Bielsa – Development and evaluation of the Galleria mellonella (Greater wax moth) model to study Brucella host pathogen interaction

Taxonomy, Evolution, Emerging Species

Alina Kühn – Identification of atypical Brucella spp. by MALDI ToF MS

Prof Moryion and Prof. Al-Dahouk received the prizes on their behalf.

Again, many thanks for Rebekah Tiller and her group of volunteers who did the fantastic job of evaluating the posters and to the National Scientific Committee that carried out a preliminary evaluation for helping in deciding.

I take the occasion to remind anyone who wants to join the ‘brucelist’ (to get information about the next meetings, and to be able to ask questions to the international brucellosis community) who did not give their names to Sue at the meeting, please send her an e mail (shagius@agcenter.lsu.edu) with your name, e mail address and affiliation. She can then pass this on to Cynthia Baldwin who will add you.

Best wishes

Fabrizio De Massis