F. Javier Salguero Bodes Poster 2024

Dr F. Javier Salguero Bodes

UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), United Kingdom (UK)

Histopathology and Cellular Profiles of Experimental TB granulomas in Guinea Pigs

Poster Abstract

The guinea pig model of Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection shares many features with the pathology observed in human TB. Our group works with a variety of TB animal models, including non-human primates and mouse models, with well established lesion scoring systems. We have established a new histopathological lesion categorisation for the granulomatous lesions observed in experimental pulmonary TB in guinea pigs, with four developmental stages (I-IV) identified, from very small aggregates of macrophages and few heterophils (stage I) to large caseotic and coalescing granulomas (stage IV). We have used immunohistochemistry (IHC) to study the presence and distribution of macrophages, T cells, B cells and granulocytes in all granulomata developmental stages. We have used digital image analysis to evaluate the presence of all the IHC marked cell types showing an increase in T cells and granulocytes alongside the granuloma stage development. Moreover, we have used this histopathology scoring system and the IHC to evaluate the severity of splenic and pulmonary infection with two strains of Mycobacterium tuberculosis Erdman and HN878, showing more severe splenic pathology and distinct cellular profiles in animals infected with Erdman. 

Biography

Javier graduated as a veterinarian in 1997 from the University of Córdoba, Spain, and then went on to gain his PhD in Comparative Pathology in 2001. He moved to the Spanish Government National Institute for Research in Animal Health (CISA-INIA) in Madrid, becoming the Head of the Experimental Pathology Unit until 2007, when he moved to the UK to work for the Veterinary Laboratories Agency (now APHA) as a veterinary research pathologist. He was appointed Reader in Comparative Pathology at the University of Surrey in October 2013 and moved to Public Health England (now United Kingdom Health Security Agency) as Scientific Leader (Pathology) in September 2018. He has been studying the host-pathogen interaction and working on animal model development and use (vaccine and therapeutic development and evaluation) in a variety of infectious diseases with a main focus on tuberculosis, but also COVID19 and other respiratory viral infections, leishmaniasis, melioidosis, glanders, and many other zoonoses. He is a visiting academic at the Universities of Oxford and Surrey in the U.K., and Cordoba, in Spain. He is co-author of more than 190 scientific publications and has successfully supervised numerous PhD, MSc and undergraduate students, mentoring numerous graduate students from Africa and America.