Environmental contamination and pig disease: an Australian microbe evolves

澳大利亚养猪业每年从超过475万头猪中生产猪肉商品。工业规模养猪场的传染病可能对猪肉生产产生破坏性影响，特别是对饲料转化效率和增长率造成破坏性影响，并可能造成下游环境污染和食品安全风险。该项目旨在通过研究一种似乎在澳大利亚独一无二地进化的微生物来评估当前猪的传染病问题。这些结果可以为合理设计监测、预防和治疗策略提供参考，以最大限度地减少澳大利亚猪的感染暴发，并可能为猪肉行业带来生产效益，减少环境微生物污染和更安全的食品。

The Australian pig industry produces pork commodities from over 4.75 million pigs per year. Infectious diseases in industrial-scale piggeries can have a devastating effect on pork production, particularly on feed conversion efficiency and growth rates, and can pose downstream environmental contamination and food safety risks. This project aims to assess a current infectious disease problem in pigs by studying a microbe that appears to have uniquely evolved in Australia. These results could inform the rational design of monitoring, prevention and treatment strategies to minimise infection outbreaks in Australian pigs and may result in production benefits to the pork industry, reduced environmental microbial contamination and safer food.