Departmental Impact

University spin offs

Department of Parasitology is engaged in development of vaccines with an aim to protect livestock from the existing parasitic challenges.

Recently, a patent on the parasite attenuation has been submitted by Prof. Dr. Muhammad Imran Rashid whereas another patent on the use of essential oils in the control of ectoparasites and vectors is under submission by Dr. Haroon Akbar and Dr. Muhammad Oneeb.

Under same aim, the research projects of the department are focused on development and validation of vaccines based on innovative ideas like mentioned below:

  1. Vaccine development against Parasites of Economic Importance exploiting Next-Generation Sequencing Technologies like RNA-Seq as well as exploiting biotechnology to develop and validate subunit vaccines against parasitic diseases of livestock including but not limited to Haemoparasites (Babesiosis and Theileriosis), Gastro-intestinal parasites (Haemonchosis) and Ectoparasites (Ticks).
  2. Rauf U, S Shabir, M Khan, I Rashid, H Akbar, A Durrani (2020). Identification of 23 kD immunogen from native antigens of Babesia bigemina in splenectomized calf. Intl J Agric Biol 24:1788‒1794
  3. Rauf U, Suleman M, Abid A, Jamil H, Menghwar H, Durrani AZ, Rashid MI, Akbar H. Humoral and Cell-Mediated Immune Response Validation in Calves after a Live Attenuated Vaccine of Babesia bigemina. Pathogens. 2020 Nov 11;9(11):936. doi: 10.3390/pathogens9110936. PMID: 33187270; PMCID: PMC7698288.
    Online Link: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33187270/
    Online ISSN: 2076-0817, Indexing Agency: ISI
  4. Rasool MF, Ahmad N, Akbar H, Yaqub T, Ashraf K, Anjum AA, Hafeez MA, Ali MM: Bm86 genetic diversity of indigenous tick population from Punjab Province Pakistan. Kafkas Univ Vet Fak Derg, 27 (2): 173-181, 2021. DOI: 10.9775/kvfd.2020.25019. https://vetdergikafkas.org/uploads/pdf/pdf_KVFD_2777.pdf
  5. Rauf U, Rashid MI, Akbar H, K. Majeed, I. Raheem, J. Nawaz, Durrani AZ. Optimization of Conditions for Cultivation of Babesia bigemina-infected RBCs. Indian Journal of Animal Research. 2021 DOI: 10.18805/IJAR.B-1276.
    Online Link: https://arccjournals.com/journal/indian-journal-of-animal-research/B-1276