La Crosse Fish Health Center Diagnostics

We use traditional technology to grow and identify bacteria that are present in the organism. Cultures are grown on tryptic soy grown agar(TSA). Traditional biochemicals are used to sort out different isolates to start the identification process. More advanced approaches are also used for identification such as Biolog, 16S sequencing, direct fluorescence antibody tagging (DFAT),  and other molecular techniques.

We use traditional PCR and quantitative PCR (qPCR) as a confirmatory assay, or as an initial screening tool. We use PCR to help us identify viruses, bacteria, and parasites.

The La Crosse Fish Health Center aids many federal, state, and tribal partners to identify parasites found in hatchery and wild settings. The Health Center assists agencies to describe parasites from all the major groups such as:

• Internal and External Protozoans 
• Monogenetic trematodes
• Digenic trematodes
• Nematodes (roundworms)
• Cestodes (Tapeworms)
• Acanthocephalans (Spiny-Headed worms)
• Parasitic Crustaceans
• Myxosporidians 
• Microsporidians

NOTE: The Fish Health Center provides expertise and diagnostics only in parasites in aquatic species, NOT humans or mammals.

Tissue cell culture is used to screen for many fish viruses. Tissues cell culture uses various cell lines derived from many species of fish.