Improved immunogenicity of Newcastle disease virus inactivated vaccine following DNA vaccination using Newcastle disease virus hemagglutinin-neuraminidase and fusion protein genes

The present study describes the development of DNA vaccines using the hemagglutinin-neuraminidase (HN) and fusion (F) genes from AF2240 Newcastle disease virus strain, namely pIRES/HN, pIRES/F and pIRES-F/HN. Transient expression analysis of the constructs in Vero cells revealed the successful expression of gene inserts in vitro. Moreover, in vivo experiments showed that single vaccination with the constructed plasmid DNA (pDNA) followed by a boost with inactivated vaccine induced a significant difference in enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay antibody levels (p < 0.05) elicited by either pIRES/F, pIRES/F+ pIRES/HN or pIRES-F/HN at one week after the booster in specific pathogen free chickens when compared with the inactivated vaccine alone. Taken together, these results indicated that recombinant pDNA could be used to increase the efficacy of the inactivated vaccine immunization procedure.

Effect of nano-zinc oxide on doxorubicin- induced oxidative stress and sperm disorders in adult male Wistar rats

Doxorubicin [DOX], an anthracycline antibiotic, is a widely used anticancer agent. In spite of its high antitumor efficacy, the use of DOX in clinical chemotherapy is limited due to diverse toxicities, including gonadotoxicity. We investigated the protective effect of nano-zinc oxide [nZnO] as an established antioxidant on DOX-induced testicular disorders. In this experimental study 24 adult male Wistar rats were divided into four groups including one control and three experimentals [6 rats per group]. They received saline [as control], DOX alone [6 mg/kg body weight, i.p.], nZnO alone [5 mg/kg body weight, i.p.], and nZnO followed by DOX. Animals were sacrificed 28 days after treatment and evaluations were made by sperm count and measuring sex hormone levels in plasma. Also total antioxidant power [TAP] and lipid peroxidation [LPO] in plasma were tested. Data was analyzed with SPSS-14 and one way ANOVA test. P<0.05 were considered to be statistically significant. In the DOX-exposed rats significant differences were found compared with the control group [p=0.001] in plasma total antioxidant power [TAP] [425.50 +/- 32.33 vs. 493.33 +/- 18.54 mmol/mL], Lipid peroxidation [LPO] [3.70 +/- 0.44 vs. 2.78 +/- 0.68 micromol/mL], plasma testosterone [3.38 +/- 0.69 vs. 5.40 +/- 0.89 ng/dl], LH [0.26 +/- 0.05 vs. 0.49 +/- 0.18 mlU/mL], sperm count [157.98 +/- 6.29 vs. 171.71 +/- 4.42x10[6]/mL] and DNA damage [11.51 +/- 3.45 vs. 6.04 +/- 2.83%]. Co-administration of nZnO significantly improved DOX-induced changes [p=0.013] in plasma TAP [471.83 +/- 14.51 mmol/mL], LPO [2.83 +/- 0.75 micro mol/mL], plasma testosterone [5.00 +/- 1.07 ng/dl], LH [0.52 +/- 0.08 mlU/mL], sperm count [169.13 +/- 5.01x10[[6]/mL] and DNA damage [7.00 +/- 1.67%]. At the dose designed in the present investigation cytoprotective role of nano-zinc oxide through its antioxidant potential is illuminated in DOX-induced male gonadotoxicity.