ABSTRACT
A 40-year old female chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) developed hyporexia, weight loss, followed by progressive and complete blindness. Tomography demonstrated an intracranial mass in the rostroventral brain involving the optic chiasm, with a presumptive diagnosis of neoplasm. However, histopathology revealed a granulomatous meningoencephalitis, and tissue samples tested positive for Mycobacterium tuberculosis.
Subject(s)
Ape Diseases , Blindness , Meningoencephalitis , Mycobacterium tuberculosis , Pan troglodytes , Animals , Female , Ape Diseases/diagnosis , Ape Diseases/microbiology , Ape Diseases/pathology , Mycobacterium tuberculosis/isolation & purification , Blindness/veterinary , Blindness/etiology , Blindness/microbiology , Blindness/diagnosis , Meningoencephalitis/veterinary , Meningoencephalitis/microbiology , Meningoencephalitis/diagnosis , Granuloma/veterinary , Granuloma/microbiology , Granuloma/pathology , Granuloma/diagnosis , Tuberculosis/veterinary , Tuberculosis/diagnosis , Tuberculosis/complicationsABSTRACT
Bovine leukemia virus (BLV) is an oncogenic member of the genus Deltaretrovirus. BLV infects cattle worldwide and is responsible for significant economic losses. The objective of this study was to validate real-time quantitative PCR (qPCR) for the detection of BLV. After identification of the most efficient qPCR, the limits of detection, repeatability, and reproducibility were determined. The results indicate that qPCR can be easily reproduced between laboratories with high sensitivity. The test variation was low in samples from lesions suggestive of bovine leukosis or whole blood.
Subject(s)
Enzootic Bovine Leukosis , Leukemia Virus, Bovine , Animals , Cattle , Enzootic Bovine Leukosis/diagnosis , Genomics , Leukemia Virus, Bovine/genetics , Leukemia Virus, Bovine/isolation & purification , Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction , Reproducibility of ResultsABSTRACT
Pseudocowpox is a zoonosis caused by pseudocowpox virus (PCPV), which mainly affects cows but can be an occupational disease of humans. The aim of the study was to validate a quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) assay for the detection of PCPV. The assay was able to detect up to 1000 copies of PCPV per µL in field samples, with a sensitivity of 80% and a specificity of 100%. We did not observe any cross-reactivity between PCPV-positive samples and samples that were positive for other genetically similar viruses. The repeatability and reproducibility were adequate according to parameters preestablished in official test validation manuals.
Subject(s)
Polymerase Chain Reaction/methods , Poxviridae Infections/virology , Pseudocowpox Virus/genetics , Animals , Cattle , Cattle Diseases/virology , Humans , Poxviridae Infections/veterinary , Reproducibility of Results , Sensitivity and Specificity , Zoonoses/virologyABSTRACT
Bovine alphaherpesvirus 2 (BoHV-2) is the etiologic agent of bovine mammillitis (BM) and pseudo-lumpy skin disease. BM is also important because its clinical presentation can be confused with foot-and-mouth disease (FMD), making it necessary to establish differential diagnoses and perform additional laboratory tests. The objective of this work was to use a validated real-time PCR assay to test for the presence of BoHV-2 in samples from cattle and buffalo with suspected vesicular disease in Brazil. The method could detect the virus at a concentration of 0.5 fg/µL and had 99.4% amplification efficiency, a repeatability error of only 4.1%, and good reproducibility with other reagents. No evidence of BoHV-2 causing vesicular disease in cattle and buffalo was found in this work. This study was able to validate a new methodology for detection of BoHV-2 and evaluate its usefulness for investigating outbreaks of vesicular disease Brazil. The importance of BoHV-2 in cases involving other clinical signs should still be studied using the qPCR developed in this work.
Subject(s)
Cattle Diseases/virology , Herpesviridae Infections/veterinary , Herpesvirus 1, Bovine/isolation & purification , Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction/methods , Animals , Brazil/epidemiology , Buffaloes/virology , Cattle , Cattle Diseases/epidemiology , Herpesviridae Infections/epidemiology , Herpesviridae Infections/virology , Herpesvirus 1, Bovine/classification , Herpesvirus 1, Bovine/geneticsABSTRACT
Infection with ovine gammaherpesvirus 2 (OvHV-2) is generally asymptomatic in sheep; however, when it crosses the species barrier, it causes malignant catarrhal fever (MCF) in cattle. In the present study, we developed a real-time PCR assay and a droplet digital PCR assay and use both methods to study an outbreak caused by OvHV-2. Both PCR methods showed high sensitivity and specificity and were able to detect low copy numbers of OvHV-2 in sheep and cattle. The present study describes the first digital PCR quantification of OvHV-2 genome copies in samples collected from sheep and cattle.
