National Reference Laboratory for the Detection of Trichinella in the Meat of Domestic and Wild Animals

Founded: INEP has been designated by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management, the Veterinary Directorate, Decision no. 323-06-03378/3/2022-05 from 26/10/2022, as the National Reference Laboratory for the Detection of Trichinella in the Meat of Domestic and Wild Animals. 

Organisational unit: Department of Immunology and Immunoparasitology
Head of the department: Saša Vasilev, PhD, Sci Vet Med, Senior Research Associate at INEP

As a reference laboratory, INEP specifically aims to contribute to Serbia’s veterinary service in areas that its staff specializes in-organization and implementation of quality control of the detection of Trichinella spp larvae; identification of the types of Trichinella spp larvae which can be found in animals in Serbia; cooperation with other reference laboratories and, when necessary, helping laboratories in the region.

Since its foundation, the Institute for the Application of Nuclear Energy (INEP) has been researching basic immunoparasitology. It has been intensively researching the Trichinella spiralis–host system for 42 years now, and this research is conducted in cooperation with the leading local and international institutes.

The Ministry of Agriculture has recognized INEP’s aforementioned activities in terms of basic and applied research on trichinellosis, and it has granted INEP the status of the Reference Laboratory for Trichinellosis (RLT) through Decision no. 5/ 0-04-001/015,1993. RLT’s founder and first manager was the world-renowned expert Kosta Čuperlović, PhD, Doctor of Veterinary Medicine.

The next manager of RLT was Ljiljana Sofronić-Milosavljević, PhD, a scientific adviser and long-time member of the International Commission on Trichinellosis). Under her management, this laboratory achieved the status of a reference laboratory for human trichinellosis in 2008 (Decision of the Ministry of Health no. 022-04-44/2009-02). There are two more members of the International Commission on Trichinellosis working at INEP-Alisa Gruden Movsesijan, PhD, a scientific adviser, and Saša Vasilev, PhD, Sci Vet Med, a senior scientific associate.

In the said period, 10 PhD dissertations on trichinella were written at INEP, while another 2 dissertations are in progress. Three Master’s theses have been defended, and the list of publications currently includes 98 papers on the SCI list, 56 of which were published in the 2000-2022 period. The results presented in the dissertations and publications stem from participation in international and national projects. In the 2001-2022 period, three national (Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development, no. 1507, 143047, 173047) and three European projects dealing with trichinella were carried out (FP6 Project:  INCO-CT-2006-043702-SERBPARZOON, 2007-2009; COST Action BM 1305, 2014-2017, COST Action FA1408-A European Network for Foodborne Parasites (Euro-FBP) 2015-2019). A bilateral project with Austria financed by the Innovation Fund was successfully completed in 2021. Research activities are still being conducted owing to institutional funding by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development.

The institute has professional staff working with trichinella, trichinella infections and trichinellosis (the team comprises 11 highly educated experts and 1 laboratory technician). The highly educated employees include 3 veterinarians, 3 doctors, 4 molecular biologists and 1 technologist, 7 of whom have a PhD, 3 are doctoral candidates and 1 is a microbiology specialist.

The laboratory is qualified to organize Proficiency Testing (PT) schemes used to: 1. detect trichinella larvae in meat and 2. detect specific anti-Trichinella antibodies or antigens in the sera/bodily fluids of animals and humans. In 2017, INEP successfully organized the first national PT scheme for quality control and testing meat samples for Trichinella larvae. By doing this, Serbia has met one of the EU’s requirements, thus joining the countries where NRLTs organize quality control through PT activities, as well as quality improvement of the work done in laboratories where artificial digestion is carried out. So far, INEP has conducted three PTs for the detection of Trichinella larvae in meat, the 1st one in 2017, the 2nd one in 2021, and the 3rd one in 2022, in which the Scientific Veterinary Institute and the Specialized Veterinary Institute took part. The results of the PT were published in the Veterinary Gazette (Veterinarski glasnik) (2019) and Meat Technology (2021). The abovementioned activities in the implementation of PT were carried out under the management of Saša Vasilev, PhD.

RLT’s operations are constantly enhanced through continuous cooperation with the European Union Reference Laboratory for Parasites (EURLP, ISS, Rome, It), namely through:  1. participation in regular annual meetings 2. participation in quality control (PT) organized by EURLP for reference laboratories in EU member countries (since 2007), 3. professional development of INEP’s staff.

INEP uses a quality management system. The institute is certified to work according to the following standards: ISO 9001:2008; ISO 13485:2003; ISO/IEC 17025:2006, and they’re also planning to introduce the 17043:2010 standard.

INEP was once again entered into the register of laboratories which is maintained by the Veterinary Directorate on 18 April 2022. Saša Vasilev, PhD, Sci Vet Med, senior scientific associate, is the manager of INEP’s laboratory for veterinary medicine. Once again, INEP’s business operations also include veterinary medicine, which is handled by the veterinary department, which currently consists of three veterinarians (one Doctor of Philosophy as a senior scientific associate, one research associate and one researcher-intern).