COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) - Researchers studying a deadly bat disease are turning their attention to a type of bacteria that inhibits fungal growth.
The Columbia Missourian reports that Sybill Amelon, a Columbia-based wildlife biologist for the U.S. Forest Service, plans to try out the bacteria treatment in a cave for the first time this winter. Amelon is working with Chris Cornelison, who first studied the bacteria while conducting food preservation research at Georgia State University. As a postdoctoral researcher, Cornelison found the bacteria could, without direct contact with fruit, inhibit fungal growth and delay ripening.
Cornelison then began testing the bacteria against the white-nose fungus, which has killed more than 6 million bats. The results kept coming back positive and ultimately caught the eye of the U.S. Forest Service, which hired Cornelison and brought his research to Amelon.
"She's been our greatest ally," Cornelison said. "Really, it's accelerated rapidly."
After exhaustive trials, the research is moving into the field. Bats will be pulled out of a cave, treated in the lab and then returned to the cave. Amelon and Cornelison have identified four test sites, one of which is in Boone County, though exact locations were not disclosed.
"You always have to temper your excitement when you do a lab experiment. In the lab, you have perfect conditions," said Amelon, whose offices are at the University of Missouri's Natural Resources Building. "But we're still really, really encouraged that we will see increased survival."
Kirsten Alvey, executive director of the Missouri Bat Census, called the treatment developed by Amelon and Cornelison "one of the top three" research projects in the works for white nose syndrome.
Bat Conservation International, an advocacy group based in Austin, Texas, has been funding the research since 2012. The most recent grant for the two was $50,000.
"The questions that get me excited are the ones that are going to solve the problem, and Chris was asking them," Katie Gillies, a biologist at Bat Conservation International, said. "That's something that we want to support. I'd like to find more money to fund this."