Make Histri: reconstructing the exchange history of bacterial and archaeal type strains

Bert Verslyppe; Wim De Smet; Bernard De Baets; Paul De Vos; Peter Dawyndt

doi:10.1016/j.syapm.2011.01.004

Make Histri: reconstructing the exchange history of bacterial and archaeal type strains

Syst Appl Microbiol. 2011 Jul;34(5):328-36. doi: 10.1016/j.syapm.2011.01.004. Epub 2011 Apr 22.

Authors

Bert Verslyppe¹, Wim De Smet, Bernard De Baets, Paul De Vos, Peter Dawyndt

Affiliation

¹ Laboratory of Microbiology, Ghent University, K.L. Ledeganckstraat 35, 9000 Ghent, Belgium.

PMID: 21514082
DOI: 10.1016/j.syapm.2011.01.004

Abstract

Each transfer of a microbial strain between a Biological Resource Center (BRC) and an individual researcher or another BRC imposes a risk of contamination or human error. Such artifacts jeopardize the quality of scientific results. In order to trace back possible scientific discrepancies that can be linked to failure of authenticity of the biological material involved, we launched the 'Make Histri' project that aims at reconstructing the exchange history ('Histri') of all bacterial and archaeal type strains as can be deduced from the information contained in BRC online catalogs. A Histri, visualized as a rooted tree, contains all known strain numbers attributed to the various cultures of a given strain, annotated with additional information about each transfer of microbial material.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Archaea / classification*
Bacteria / classification*
Chryseobacterium
Databases, Factual*
Software
Terminology as Topic
User-Computer Interface