Treponeme-Associated Hoof Disease of Free-Ranging Elk (Cervus elaphus) in Southwestern Washington State, USA

2018 ◽  
Vol 56 (1) ◽  
pp. 118-132 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sushan Han ◽  
Kristin G. Mansfield ◽  
Dan S. Bradway ◽  
Thomas E. Besser ◽  
Deryck H. Read ◽  
...  

A novel foot disease in free-ranging elk ( Cervus elaphus) in southwestern Washington State emerged in 2008 and spread throughout the region. Initial studies showed adult elk had chronic hoof overgrowth, sole ulcers, and sloughed hoof capsules, but no cause was determined. To identify possible causes and characterize the earliest lesions, 9-, 7-, and 3-month-old elk were collected. Nine-month-old elk had sole ulcers (3/9 elk) and sloughed/overgrown hoof capsules (4/9 elk) similar to adults. Histologically, lesions consisted of coronary, heel bulb, and interdigital ulcers with suppurative inflammation, epithelial hyperplasia, deeply invasive spirochetes, and underrunning of the hoof capsule and heel-sole junction. Spirochetes were identified as Treponema via immunohistochemistry and polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Seven-month-old elk had similar underrunning foot ulcers (6/8 elk) with Treponema identified in all lesions but no chronic overgrowth or sloughed hoof capsules. Three-month-old calves had superficial coronary erosions with no inflammation or identifiable spirochetes (3/5 elk) but were culture/PCR positive for Treponema, suggesting possible early lesions. Lesions from 9- and 7-month-old elk included aerobic and anaerobic bacteria, many of which are associated with infectious foot disease in livestock. Antibody enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay of 7- and 3-month-old elk from the enzootic region showed a trend toward increased Treponema antibody titers compared to normal control elk from outside the region, further supporting the significance of Treponema in the pathogenesis of foot disease. Treponeme-associated hoof disease (TAHD) in elk, a debilitating and progressive condition, shares similarities to bovine digital dermatitis and contagious ovine digital dermatitis.

2022 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer H. Wilson-Welder ◽  
Kristin Mansfield ◽  
Sushan Han ◽  
Darrell O. Bayles ◽  
David P. Alt ◽  
...  

A hoof disease among wild elk (Cervus elaphus) in the western United States has been reported since 2008. Now present in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and California, this hoof disease continues to spread among elk herds suggesting an infectious etiology. Causing severe lesions at the hoof-skin junction, lesions can penetrate the hoof-horn structure causing severe lameness, misshapen hooves, and in some cases, sloughed hooves leaving the elk prone to infection, malnutrition, and premature death. Isolated to the feet, this disease has been termed treponeme-associated hoof disease due to the numerous Treponema spp. found within lesions. In addition to the Treponema spp., treponeme-associated hoof disease shares many similarities with digital dermatitis of cattle and livestock including association with several groups of anaerobic bacteria such as Bacteroides, Clostridia, and Fusobacterium, neutrophilic inflammatory infiltrate, and restriction of the disease to the foot and hoof tissues. To determine if there was a transmissible infectious component to this disease syndrome, elk lesion homogenate was used in a sheep model of digital dermatitis. Ten animals were inoculated with lesion material and lesion development was followed over 7 weeks. Most inoculated feet developed moderate to severe lesions at 2- or 4-weeks post-inoculation timepoints, with 16 of 18 feet at 4 weeks also had spirochetes associated within the lesions. Histopathology demonstrated spirochetes at the invading edge of the lesions along with other hallmarks of elk hoof disease, neutrophilic inflammatory infiltrates, and keratinocyte erosion. Treponema-specific PCR demonstrated three phylotypes associated with elk hoof disease and digital dermatitis were present. Serum of infected sheep had increased anti-Treponema IgG when compared to negative control sheep and pre-exposure samples. Analysis of the bacterial microbiome by sequencing of the bacterial 16S rRNA gene showed a community structure in sheep lesions that was highly similar to the elk lesion homogenate used as inoculum. Bacteroidies, Fusobacterium, and Clostridia were among the bacterial taxa overrepresented in infected samples as compared to negative control samples. In conclusion, there is a highly transmissible, infectious bacterial component to elk treponeme-associated hoof disease which includes several species of Treponema as well as other bacteria previously associated with digital dermatitis.


2014 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 88-94 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. R. Clegg ◽  
K. G. Mansfield ◽  
K. Newbrook ◽  
L. E. Sullivan ◽  
R. W. Blowey ◽  
...  

Since 2008, a large increase in the numbers of cases of lameness have been seen in wild North American elk (Cervus elaphus) from Washington State, USA. The most recent cases manifested as foot lesions similar both clinically and pathologically to those seen in digital dermatitis (DD) in cattle and sheep, a disease with a bacterial etiopathogenesis. To determine whether the same bacteria considered responsible for DD are associated with elk lameness, lesion samples were subjected to bacterial isolation studies and PCR assays for three phylogroups of relevant DD treponemes. The DD treponemes were isolated from lesional tissues but not from control feet or other areas of the diseased foot (including the coronary band or interdigital space), suggesting that the bacteria are strongly associated with DD lesions and may therefore be causal. In addition, PCR analysis revealed that all three unique DD treponeme phylotypes were found in elk hoof disease, and in 23% of samples, all 3 DD-associated treponemes were present in lesions. Sequence analysis of the 16S rRNA gene showed that the elk lesion treponemes were phylogenetically almost identical to those isolated from cattle and sheep DD lesions. The isolates were particularly similar to two of the three culturable DD treponeme phylotypes: specifically, theTreponema medium/Treponema vincentii-like andTreponema phagedenis-like DD spirochetes. The third treponeme culturable phylogroup (Treponema pedis), although detected by PCR, was not isolated. This is the first report describing isolation of DD treponemes from a wildlife host, suggesting that the disease may be evolving to include a wider spectrum of cloven-hoofed animals.


2009 ◽  
Vol 54 (No. 4) ◽  
pp. 191-193
Author(s):  
K. Sedlak ◽  
T. Girma ◽  
J. Holejsovsky

372 sera of cervids from the Czech Republic were examined for antibodies to the bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) and border disease virus (BDV) by competitive-inhibition enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), and for the presence of the BVDV by AgELISA. Antibodies to BVDV/BDV were found in 0.6% (two positive/305 tested) red deer (<I>Cervus elaphus</I>). BVDV/BDV antibodies were not found in four sika deer (<I>Cervus Nippon</I>) and 63 fallow deer (<I>Dama dama</I>). All serum samples were BVDV antigen negative. Our results confirmed that red deer in the Czech Republic are only rarely infected with Pestiviruses. This was the first survey of pestiviruses in farmed and wild cervids in the Czech Republic.


Viruses ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (8) ◽  
pp. 1548
Author(s):  
Ana Gradissimo ◽  
Viswanathan Shankar ◽  
Fanua Wiek ◽  
Lauren St. Peter ◽  
Yevgeniy Studentsov ◽  
...  

The goal of this study was to investigate the serological titers of circulating antibodies against human papillomavirus (HPV) type 16 (anti-HPV16) prior to the detection of an incident HPV16 or HPV31 infection amongst vaccinated participants. Patients were selected from a prospective post-HPV vaccine longitudinal cohort at Mount Sinai Adolescent Health Center in Manhattan, NY. We performed a nested case–control study of 43 cases with incident detection of cervical HPV16 (n = 26) or HPV31 (n = 17) DNA who had completed the full set of immunizations of the quadrivalent HPV vaccine (4vHPV). Two control individuals whom had received three doses of the vaccine (HPV16/31-negative) were selected per case, matched on age at the first dose of vaccination and follow-up time in the study: a random control, and a high-risk control that was in the upper quartile of a sexual risk behavior score. We conducted an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) for the detection of immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies specific to anti-HPV16 virus-like particles (VLPs). The results suggest that the average log antibody titers were higher among high-risk controls than the HPV16/31 incident cases and the randomly selected controls. We show a prospective association between anti-HPV16 VLP titers and the acquisition of an HPV16/31 incident infection post-receiving three doses of 4vHPV vaccine.


2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
J. S. Duncan ◽  
J. W. Angell ◽  
P. Richards ◽  
L. Lenzi ◽  
G. J. Staton ◽  
...  

Abstract Background Contagious Ovine Digital Dermatitis (CODD) is an emerging and common infectious foot disease of sheep which causes severe welfare and economic problems for the sheep industry. The aetiology of the disease is not fully understood and control of the disease is problematic. The aim of this study was to investigate the polybacterial aetiopathogenesis of CODD and the effects of antibiotic treatment, in a longitudinal study of an experimentally induced disease outbreak using a 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing approach. Results CODD was induced in 15/30 experimental sheep. During the development of CODD three distinct phenotypic lesion stages were observed. These were an initial interdigital dermatitis (ID) lesion, followed by a footrot (FR) lesion, then finally a CODD lesion. Distinct microbiota were observed for each lesion in terms of microbial diversity, clustering and composition. Porphyromonadaceae, Family XI, Veillonellaceae and Fusobacteriaceae were significantly associated with the diseased feet. Veillonellaceae and Fusobacteriaceae were most associated with the earlier stages of ID and footrot rather than CODD. Following antibiotic treatment of the sheep, the foot microbiota showed a strong tendency to return to the composition of the healthy state. The microbiota composition of CODD lesions collected by swab and biopsy methods were different. In particular, the Spirochaetaceae family were more abundant in samples collected by the biopsy method, suggesting that these bacteria are present in deeper tissues of the diseased foot. Conclusion In this study, CODD presented as part of a spectrum of poly-bacterial foot disease strongly associated with bacterial families Porphyromonadaceae, Family XI (a family in Clostridiales also known as Clostridium cluster XI), Veillonellaceae and Fusobacteriaceae which are predominately Gram-negative anaerobes. Following antibiotic treatment, the microbiome showed a strong tendency to return to the composition of the healthy state. The composition of the healthy foot microbiome does not influence susceptibility to CODD. Based on the data presented here and that CODD appears to be the severest end stage of sheep infectious foot disease lesions, better control of the initial ID and FR lesions would enable better control of CODD and enable better animal welfare.


Viruses ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 1283
Author(s):  
Katendi Changula ◽  
Edgar Simulundu ◽  
Boniface Pongombo Lombe ◽  
Eri Nakayama ◽  
Hiroko Miyamoto ◽  
...  

Ebolaviruses and marburgviruses are filoviruses that are known to cause severe hemorrhagic fever in humans and nonhuman primates (NHPs). While some bat species are suspected to be natural reservoirs of these filoviruses, wild NHPs often act as intermediate hosts for viral transmission to humans. Using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay, we screened two NHP species, wild baboons and vervet monkeys captured in Zambia, for their serum IgG antibodies specific to the envelope glycoproteins of filoviruses. From 243 samples tested, 39 NHPs (16%) were found to be seropositive either for ebolaviruses or marburgviruses with endpoint antibody titers ranging from 100 to 25,600. Interestingly, antibodies reactive to Reston virus, which is found only in Asia, were detected in both NHP species. There was a significant difference in the seropositivity for the marburgvirus antigen between the two NHP species, with baboons having a higher positive rate. These results suggest that wild NHPs in Zambia might be nonlethally exposed to these filoviruses, and this emphasizes the need for continuous monitoring of filovirus infection in wild animals to better understand the ecology of filoviruses and to assess potential risks of outbreaks in humans in previously nonendemic countries.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Markus H. Kainulainen ◽  
Eric Bergeron ◽  
Payel Chatterjee ◽  
Asheley P. Chapman ◽  
Joo Lee ◽  
...  

AbstractSARS-CoV-2 emerged in late 2019 and has since spread around the world, causing a pandemic of the respiratory disease COVID-19. Detecting antibodies against the virus is an essential tool for tracking infections and developing vaccines. Such tests, primarily utilizing the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) principle, can be either qualitative (reporting positive/negative results) or quantitative (reporting a value representing the quantity of specific antibodies). Quantitation is vital for determining stability or decline of antibody titers in convalescence, efficacy of different vaccination regimens, and detection of asymptomatic infections. Quantitation typically requires two-step ELISA testing, in which samples are first screened in a qualitative assay and positive samples are subsequently analyzed as a dilution series. To overcome the throughput limitations of this approach, we developed a simpler and faster system that is highly automatable and achieves quantitation in a single-dilution screening format with sensitivity and specificity comparable to those of ELISA.


2007 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 297-302 ◽  
Author(s):  
Olga Sánchez Negrette ◽  
Fernando J. Sánchez Valdéz ◽  
Carlos D. Lacunza ◽  
María Fernanda García Bustos ◽  
María Celia Mora ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT Serological tests are the main laboratory procedures used for diagnosis during the indeterminate and chronic stages of Chagas' disease. A serological regression to negativity is the main criterion used to define parasitological cure in treated patients. The aim of this work was to monitor the individual specificities of antibody levels for 3 years posttreatment in 18 adult patients. Conventional serological techniques (hemagglutination assays and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay [ELISA]) were modified by using recombinant antigens to detect early markers of treatment effectiveness. For this purpose, serum samples were taken before and during treatment and every 6 months after treatment for at least 3 years. When hemagglutination assays were used, a decrease in antibody levels was observed in only one patient. When ELISA with serum dilutions was used, antibody clearance became much more apparent: in 77.7% (14/18) of the patients, antibody titers became negative with time. This was observed at serum dilutions of 1/320 and occurred between the 6th and the 30th months posttreatment. The immune response and the interval for a serological regression to negativity were different for each patient. For some of the recombinant antigens, only 50% (9/18) of the patients reached the serological regression to negativity. Recombinant antigen 13 might be a good marker of treatment effectiveness, since 66.6% (six of nine) of the patients presented with an early regression to negativity for specific antibodies to this antigen (P = 0.002).


2001 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 245-250 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wouter T. M. Jansen ◽  
Merja Väkeväinen-Anttila ◽  
Helena Käyhty ◽  
Moon Nahm ◽  
N. Bakker ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT Antibody- and complement-mediated phagocytosis is the main defense mechanism against Streptococcus pneumoniae. A standardized, easy to perform phagocytosis assay for pneumococci would be a great asset for the evaluation of the potential efficacy of (experimental) pneumococcal vaccines. Such an assay could replace the laborious phagocytosis assay of viable pneumococci (classical killing assay). Therefore, a newly developed phagocytosis assay based on flow cytometry (flow assay) was compared with the conventional killing assay and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), using sera obtained from adults pre- and postvaccination with either a bivalent conjugate, a tetravalent conjugate, or the 23-valent polysaccharide vaccine. Highly significant correlations were observed between flow assay phagocytosis titers, killing assay phagocytosis titers, and ELISA antibody titers for serotype 6B and 23F as well. For serotype 19F, strong correlations were only observed between killing assay and ELISA titers. A potential drawback of the flow assay might be the low sensitivity compared with that of the killing assay. The choice of what assay to use, however, will depend on the objectives of the assay. When speed, easy performance, sample throughput, improved worker safety, absence of influence of antibiotics, and absence of false positives are the major criteria, the flow assay is the method of choice. When higher sensitivity is the major requirement, the classical killing assay should be used.


1978 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 268-276
Author(s):  
L H Ghose ◽  
R D Schnagl ◽  
I H Holmes

The development of a micro-scale enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) with horseradish peroxidase as the marker enzyme for the detection and measurement of human rotavirus antibodies is described. A semipurified preparation of the serologically related simian agent, SA-11 virus, was used as the antigen. Test sera were reacted with antigen-sensitized wells in disposable poly-vinyl microplates. Any attached antibody was detected by the addition of peroxidase-labeled anti-species immunoglobulin (conjugate) followed by assay of the enzyme reaction with its substrate, hydrogen peroxide plus 5-aminosalicylic acid. This micro-ELISA was compared with complement fixation in a seroepidemiological study of the age prevalence of rotavirus antibody in Aboriginal and European populations living in the same outback area in Australia. The ELISA (results read with the naked eye) proved to be approximately 16 times more sensitive than complement fixation. Of Aborigines, 71% had rotavirus complement-fixing antibody, as compared to 45% of Europeans. By ELISA 100% of both populations had rotavirus antibodies. Mean antibody titers in the different age groups were higher in Aborigines than in Europeans. Antibody levels rose steeply throughout the first 20 years of life, remained high during the next 20 years, then increased again at least up to the age of 60 years. The micro-ELISA was practical, simple to perform, and more suitable than complement fixation for large seroepidemiological rotavirus studies. It also has potential for serodiagnosis of the disease, both in the laboratory and in the field.


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