PubMLST Forum event (MRF)

Ten years on – the meningitis research foundation meningococcal genome library 

To mark this anniversary, the Maiden Lab organised a hybrid meeting on 17 September 2021, online and with a small but distinguished group of researchers in the Oxford Martin School. 

The event was held on Friday 17 September 2021, moderated by Martin CJ Maiden, and can be accessed and viewed on the PubMLST Youtube channel here

--- Or watch directly further down in the embedded video on this page.

Abstract: The Gram-negative diplococcus Neisseria meningitidis, the meningococcus, remains a globally important causative agent of meningitis and septicaemia (severe sepsis).  Ten Years ago, the Meningitis Research Foundation funded the establishment of the UK ‘Meningitis Research Foundation Meningococcus Genome Library’ (MRF-MGL), with a multi-centre award to Public Health England, the University of Oxford and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute.  Embedded withing the PubMLST.org platform MRF-MGL) stores provenance, demographic, epidemiological, and whole genome sequence information for more than 5,000 meningococci isolated from patients in the UK over the past 10 years.  Over this time, sequence-based molecular typing has become an essential component of invasive meningococcal disease surveillance world-wide and standardised typing methods and schemes have allowed comparability across reference and research laboratories in different countries.  Shortly after its inception, the MRF-MGL contributed to the introduction of the ACYW meningococcal vaccines into the UK and it remains an essential resource, nationally and internationally.

For access to the data base, please see the PubMLST MRF library landing page here; The Meningitis Research Foundation website describing the library can be found here.

Speakers:

Chris Tang, Dunn School of Pathology, University of Oxford

Linda Glennie, Meningitis Research Foundation

Jay Lucidarme, Public Health England

Holly Bratcher & Keith Jolley & Charlene Rodrigues, Department of Zoology, University of Oxford

Andrew Smith, University of Glasgow

Claire Cameron, Public Health Scotland

Chris Bayliss, University of Leicester

Muhamad-Kheir Taha, WHO, France

David Stephens, Emory University

Marko Spinsanti & Isabel Delany, GSK, Italy

Jamie Findlow, Pfizer, UK