Research interests
The goal of ongoing research is to investigate the genetic, morphological and ecological characteristics of foodborne parasites found in animals and to assess the genetic variation and structure of animal populations in the context of biodiversity, one health concept and environmental protection.
Research includes the identification of parasites of the genus Sarcocystis and development of diagnostic methods in various samples: muscle, brain and blood of intermediate hosts, small intestines of definitive hosts and environmental samples. The ecological, morphological and genetic characteristics of parasites found in wild and domestic birds and mammals are also evaluated during the research, and new species are described. Another task is the evaluation of the genetic variability of fish and bird populations, the determination of the genetic structure and the identification of evolutionarily significant and management units in the context of environmental management.
The field of scientific interests includes Parasitology, Population Genetics, Taxonomy, Phylogeny, Conservation Genetics, Bioinformatics, and Molecular Biology.
Applied methods: light and electron microscopy, isolation of DNA from various biological sources (blood, liver, muscle, scales, hair, feathers, environmental samples, microscopic cysts, etc.), PCR-RFLP, selection of species-, genus-, and family-specific oligonucleotides for PCR research, various types of PCR, microsatellite analysis, purification of PCR products, sequencing, statistical tests, analysis of DNA sequences and genotypes of microsatellite loci assessing intraspecific and interspecific genetic variability, statistical analysis of population genetic structure.
