Clinical trials of the world's first tick toxin vaccine with the potential to save the lives of tens of thousands of domestic dogs and farm animals though eastern Australia are about to commence at UTS.

Although there are over 800 known tick species internationally, only 40 of these have a toxic bite and only three or four have a venom which can be fatal. The most deadly species is concentrated in eastern Australia.

The tick affects mainly domestic dogs and cats but can also spread to livestock, causing paralysis of the hind limbs, respiratory distress and can ultimately result in death.

More than 80,000 cases of tick toxicosis are treated each year in eastern Australia. The worst affected area is Lismore on the NSW north coast, where the paralysis tick has spread through cattle and deer farms as well as many newly introduced livestock species such as alpacas.

Associate Professor Kevin Broady, Head of the UTS Department of Cell and Molecular Biology, has secured an international patent for the method of developing the vaccine and, with the assistance of the Australian company, Novogen, the product will be tested on dogs as early as December before becoming commercially available.

The current trials aim to create a synthetic (recombinant) toxin made from the isolated gene which can be used as the basis of the vaccine to be manufactured by the commercial partner. The UTS research team has been the first internationally to isolate the gene for the fatal neurotoxin released by the tick.

At present the treatment involves the administration of an immune dog serum which is a costly and often dangerous veterinary procedure.

Associate Professor Broady said research is also continuing into effects of ticks on humans.

"Mild to severe (life threatening) allergic reactions to ticks can occur among people involved in outdoor recreational or work activities," he said. "Recently a man on the NSW North Coast died in hospital following a tick bite due to a severe reaction. Some contention still exists over whether Australian ticks harbour the agents of Lyme disease but it has been well documented that tick bites have been associated with a chronic, debilitating arthritis-disease," he said.

Isolating the tick poison was a major scientific breakthrough for the UTS research team, with scientists having attempted to achieve this for more than 70 years. The difficulty in developing a tick vaccine is that, even after the poison has been isolated, it is not possible to produce a vaccine from the native material because of the tiny amounts involved.

"It would require millions of ticks to get enough vaccine to treat just a few animals," Associate Professor Broady said. Recent advances in gene technology, however, have meant that research into the commercial production of a vaccine has become possible.

"Once the gene encoding the neurotoxin had been isolated and sequenced, a recombinant toxin was then produced, "Associate Professor Broady said. "This synthetic toxin was shown in preliminary experiments to induce a protective immune response against the tick neurotoxin. So we can now use the synthetic neurotoxin to develop the vaccine."