Page 53 - LSTM_AnnualReport1415

LSTM Annual
Report 2014/15

Liverpool Insect Testing

Establishment (LITE)

Helen Williams -
Liverpool Insect Testing Establishment (LITE) was established
Head of LITE
four years ago by the Department of Vector Biology. Under Helen

Williams’ management the facility has grown considerably

and now employs a further seven xed term sta , with

plans for further expansion in the next few years.

LITE is accelerating the search for new public health insecticides
in partnership with the Public Private Partnership IVCC. These

are urgently needed as more and more disease-transmitting
insects are developing resistance to existing insecticides. LITE G

provides an e cient service to industrial partners to screen
new chemicals against using a variety of biological assays.
(MHRA) in the next 18 months. This will enable LITE to expand

services on o er and the range of clients, aiding us to achieve
Our unique selling point is the range of fully characterised, our long term vision of a fully self-funded, sustainable centre
insecticide resistant and susceptible mosquito strains
that we maintain at LSTM, all of which are characterised of excellence for evaluating products to control insect disease
vectors. A new building hosting, amongst others, six new
phenotypically and genotyped for known insecticide resistance insectaries, a range of insecticide testing facilities and rooms for
mechanisms. With support from our extensive network
behavioural studies is foreseen to open in mid-2017.
of overseas collaborators, and the scienti c expertise in
insecticide resistance within the Vector Biology Department, LITE has contributed to the outreach activities of LSTM with

we continually review and update our colonies to re ect the the deployment of two members of sta to Sierra Leone to
evolution of resistance in the eld. In addition to o ering assays Support for Ebola Testing Laboratories in country, for 5 week
on live mosquitoes we also provide chemical testing services
periods each during the year 2014-2015.
of insecticide treated materials and have developed a range of
in vitro assays to test chemicals for cross resistance to existing

insecticides.

During the past 12 months we have strengthened our quality
processes and procedures within the facility and

earlier this year we completed a successful
audit by the WHO Pesticide Evaluation

Scheme (WHOPES) which hopefully
will result in LITE becoming a WHO

Collaborating Centre.

Further developments
planned for 2016 include

formally adopting
Good Laboratory

Practice (GLP) with
the ultimate aim of

GLP compliance
inspection by
the Medicines

and Healthcare
Products

Regulatory
Agency

Setting up Polymerase Chain Reaction gels for
genotyping of mosquito colonies
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