Tuberculosis (TB) is a leading global infectious disease killer, second only to COVID-19¹. It is an airborne disease caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis bacteria and is responsible for infecting an estimated 10.6 million and killing 1.6 million people in 2021 alone¹. Every year, on March 24, we commemorate World TB Day to raise public awareness about the global impact of this burdensome disease. The theme this year is: Yes! We Can End TB².

 

In this webinar, three accomplished TB researchers will discuss how we can use next generation sequencing (NGS) to help accomplish this goal. Prof. Tim Rodwell, Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine at University of California, San Diego and FIND, the Global Alliance for Diagnostics will provide an overview of NGS technology including Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) and targeted NGS (tNGS). Prof. Vitali Sintchenko, Director of the Centre for Infectious Diseases and Microbiology – Public Health Sydney Medical School and Westmead Hospital will discuss how he uses WGS in his lab to address challenges in the fight against tuberculosis. Dr Melanie Grobbelaar, Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Division of Molecular Biology and Human Genetics, Tuberculosis Genomics Research Group, Stellenbosch University, South Africa will then talk about how she and her lab use tNGS in their battle against drug resistant TB. Both Prof. Sintchenko and Dr Melanie Grobbelaar will cover the following:

 

• Their current TB research

• How they implemented NGS in their labs including specimen types involved

• Key considerations for incorporating NGS and lessons learned from their experience

 

References:

1 Global tuberculosis report 2022. Geneva: World Health Organization; 2022. License: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.

2 www.stoptb.org/news/yes-we-can-end-tb accessed February 2, 2023