PAR605: Molecular Diagnosis in Parasitology 6 credits (40-10-10)

Objectives

The course intends to introduce modern methods in use and under development for the laboratory diagnosis of the important parasitic diseases of man and animals for clinical and epidemiological purposes. The course shall also provide opportunities to evaluate the potential applications of these methods in developing, and to improve and refine diagnosis by microscopical methods.

Contents

Laboratory management and good practice, principles of test evaluation, constraints on accuracy and applicability of tests, economic considerations, reagent supply and test development, microscopy, immunoassays for antibody and antigen, western blots, ELISA, dot ELISA, immunofluorescence, other immunoassays. Nucleic acid techniques in diagnosis. Principles of probe and primer design. Polymerase and ligase chain reaction. Culture-based diagnosis and Electron microscopical techniques in diagnosis