Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Hello, one of my students is thing king of doing a scinec project that involves testing of dog's saliva. I would like to know some ways fro us to collect the samples. Thank you very much.

how much saliva do you need per sample? If it's a small amount, then you can just take a cotton swab and gently get saliva on that by putting it in the dog's mouth. While doing this, make sure that you wear protective gloves and be careful with the dog....I don't think dogs like getting cotton swabs put into their mouths, so make sure you have someone who can properly handle the dog.

let me know if you have any more questions

good luck,
scienceexpert123

The Sarstedt Salivette can be used in collection of saliva in dog. The Salivette can be order through Fisher Scientific or directly from Sarstedt. http://www.sarstedt.com/php/main.php?in ... uppe_id=12 Here are a few articles that describe the use of Salivette in collecting saliva from dogs.

http://old.cvm.msu.edu/courses/AW/sc08/09.pdf
http://www.animalsandsociety.org/assets ... s09025.pdf

Michael

Thank you so much for such a promp reply! this site is simply amazing!

We have learnt that there is an enzyme in dog's saliva that it is effective agiants bacteria. Is there a way of separting it and testing it against bacteria,and how would we do that? thank you.

Here is an website that discuss about the enzyme (lysozyme) that kill bactiera but I am not sure is that the enzyme you plan to test in your experiment since you did not mention the name of the enzyme.
http://www.vivo.colostate.edu/hbooks/pa ... ivary.html

Here is a procedure on how you measure lysozyme.
http://ruby.fgcu.edu/courses/ndemers/Im ... 051101.doc

Here is an experiment on testing dog saliva effect on bacterial growth
http://www.gi.alaska.edu/ScienceForum/ASF12/1234.html

Michael

I would like to know how long saliva can be kep at room temperature? Can it be frozen for future testings? How long will it last if frozen? Thank you.

The storage requirement and stability would depend on what you plan to use the saliva for. The best way to find out this information is probably doing a pubmed search. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed Here is an article that discuss stability on saliva protein.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2688372/

Michael

The previous suggestion of looking up scientific papers is a good one.

Can you let us know what tests you plan to do on the saliva? Without knowing your plans, I'd say that in general getting a sample into the freezer as quickly as possible is usually the way to go. That stops any chemical reactions or bacteria activity that would otherwise be happening. The colder the freezer, the better.

My student will be testing the saliva for antimicrobial effects. Since she can not collect the salive at the same time and would need probably two weeks for all the samples to be collected and then tested on the same day. Is it OK for us to keep the samples in the freezer up to the testing? How long is too long for samples to be stored n a afreezer? Thank you.