Townsville Laboratory Service (TLS) is helping trial a synthetic alternative to blue blood of horseshoe crabs – a medical marvel currently used worldwide to detect dangerous bacterial toxins.
Specialists in the kind of bacterial endotoxin testing for which blue blood cells are essential, TLS uses the Limulus Amebocyte Lysate (LAL) method to service many of the region's public health units and screen their clinical water for safety.
It is one of a few labs in the state relied upon by Queensland Health for routine haemodialysis water endotoxin testing, and the only one run by a local Council.
The lab was recently recruited by a US-based biotech company to trial a new recombinant method that uses a synthetic compound to screen for endotoxins – essential for products like dialysis water and vaccines, as well as equipment such as scalpels and internal probes.
TLS Team Manager Edgar Salvador said the trial had been a resounding success.
"As nature's only source of LAL, which is the gold standard for bacterial endotoxin detection, the blue-blooded Atlantic horseshoe crab is critical at the moment," Mr Salvador said.
"However, these crabs are a limited resource and reliance on this technology doesn't really assure future sustainability.
"Recombinant methods like the one we have just trialled will need technical approval, but TLS has shown this alternative performs just as well as the LAL method we are currently using.
"Whilst the trial was successful, it will still take some time before approval is given by the US, European and Japanese pharmacopoeias, but this this study will definitely help support that approval process."
Mayor Nick Dametto congratulated the team on being pioneers in the biomedical space, and said TLS was a true North Queensland success story.
"It's easy to take for granted a lot of the work that goes on behind the scenes in the scientific space, including in Townsville, to make the way of life we enjoy possible," Cr Dametto said.
"The TLS is a very advanced laboratory that, on top of its chemistry testing including for PFAS, specialises in water and surface quality, microbiology, Legionella, and bacterial endotoxin testing; it really does do a lot of work to keep our city, and region, humming.
"What's also great is that, being Council-owned, its work directly contributes to the growth and prosperity of Townsville, with revenue generated by the lab reinvested into key city projects."
