Cistercian students investigate alternative to antibiotics
Surrounded by open wooded countryside, the school is situated near the abbey farm, on which 250 cows are milked.
With such strong links to agricultural life, it’s not too surprising to find that two fifth-year students in the college have chosen a Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition project with a strong farming theme.
Anyone who has milked cows knows only too well the disruption when they have to be treated with antibiotics for problems like mastitis.
Cistercian college students Angus Baker and Mark Dowley have a project for this competition that looks at an alternative to antibiotic treatment.
They have investigated the possibilities and benefits of using a bacteriophage treatment as opposed to antibiotics in lactating cows.
Angus Baker explains where the ideas for the project came from. “I got the idea from reading an article about how antibiotic resistance was a huge problem facing the world, and that alternatives must be researched and found.
Mark Dowley explains more about their fascinating project, “The problem with antibiotics at the moment is that they are being used so much and so frequently that bacteria are becoming increasingly resistant to them.”
“So, basically, we have been trying to find an alternative to antibiotics, and we believe this could well be in the form of a bacteriophage.
” This involves injecting the cow with a virus which attacks the bacteria which cause mastitis,” he says.
Basing their project on farming, and in particular on mastitis, they looked at how treating an animal with a bacteriophage compares with the more traditional antibiotic, and their findings certainly make for interesting reading.
This project by Angus and Mark is being piloted on the abbey farm. And they have also applied for a patent.
They can be contacted at btphage@gmail.com by anyone curious about the possibilities of bacteriophage treatment.
