1,721,107 research outputs found
Characterization of immune system cells (mast cells, monocyto-macrophage derived cells, PBMC) obtained from peripherial blood, bone marrow, spleen, lymphonode biopsies in humans (HIV positive or negative) and dogs infected by Leishmania spp:a key diagnostic and therapeutic approaches
No full textLeishmaniasis is one of the most important infectious diseases worldwide. Currently, 12 million people in 88 (mostly develo-
ping) countries are infected with ~2 million new infections per year. 60.000 annual deaths result from leishmaniasis. A vacci-
ne does not exist at present and some treatment options are expensive and can cause major side effects (Scott et al., Immunol.
Rev. 2004, 201:318-338). The disease is caused by an obligate intracellular parasite inoculated into the skin by the bite of a
sand fly. Humans as well as small animals and dogs are natural reservoirs for the parasite. Visceral leishmaniasis (VL) is a li-
fe threatening disease characterized by uncontrolled parasitisation of spleen, liver, and bone marrow. The mechanisms under-
lying the failure to control the growth and systemic spread of leishmania parasites in VL are not well understood. While the
absence of antigen-specific Th1 responses in PBMC from VL patients is thought to be casually related to disease progression,
the finding that these patients also express elevated IFNgamma mRNA in lesional tissue, as well as elevated serum levels of
pro-inflammatory cytokines suggests that their immunologic defect cannot be simply explained by immune tolerance or Th2
polarization. As a possible homeostatic mechanism to control persistent infection-induced inflammation, elevated levels of
regulatory cytokines IL-10 have repeatedly been reported in clinical studies of VL (Nylén and Sacks, Trends in Immunol.
2007, 28:378-384). VL, caused by the protozoan parasite Leishmania infantum, is a sand fly-borne disease found in the Me-
diterranean area, Asia, and Latin America . In most of this range, the domestic dog is the main reservoir host (Gramiccia and
Gradoni, Int. J. Parasitol. 2005, 35: 1169-1180; Dantas-Torres F., Vet. Parasitol. 2007, 149:139-146). Dogs may suffer from a
severe disease characterized by chronic evolution of viscero-cutaneous signs, which occurs in fewer than 50% of infected
animals; however, both asymptomatic and symptomatic dogs can be infectious to phlebotomine vectors. Canine leishmaniasis
(CL) is a major veterinary and public health problem in traditional areas of endemicity, but also in areas where the disease is
not endemic but outbreaks are occasionally reported, such as in the United States and Canada and northern Europe
Rotavirus diarrhoea in buffaloes: epidemiology, pathogenesys and prophilaxis
No full textGlobally, rotavirus infection is the most important cause of severe diarrhea in infants and animals. In this report, we review the results of pathogenesys studies, strain surveillance and characterization studies published and discuss new insights gained from these studies on the potential mechanisms of the evolution and spread of new rotavirus strains. Early epidemiological studies in Italian buffalo herds revealed the predominance of strains with G8 specificity and detected strains with the rare, RRV-like, VP4 P[3] genotype. In an our previous study 125 fecal samples were collected from buffalo calves affected with diarrhoea, in seven dairy farms in Southern Italy. Rotaviruses were detected in 21 samples (16.8%) by an immunochromatographic assay and by reverse transcription-PCR (RT-PCR). Analysis of the VP7 gene revealed that 57% (12 of 21) of the isolates were G6, 23.8% were G8 (5 of 21) and 19% (4 of 21) were G10. Analysis of the VP4 revealed that 71.4% (15 of 21) of the isolates were P[5] and that 28.6% (6 of 21) were P[1]. The most common combination of G and P types was P[5],G6 (57%), followed by P[1],G10 (19%), P[5],G8 (14%) and P[1],G8 (9.5%). While P[5],G6 rotaviruses are very common in Italian bovine herds, the antigenic combination Pill,G10 is unusual and presumably derives from reassortment between P[1] and G10 strains, that appear to be more frequent in buffaloes and bovines, respectively. The presence of bovine-like G and P serotypes suggests that in Italy the epidemiology of buffalo rotaviruses overlaps the epidemiology of bovine rotaviruses, presumably because of the strict species affinity and/or of the intermingled distribution over the same geographical areas of the buffalo and bovine herds
Malattie infettive degli animali
No full textPrefazione al libro: contiene le motivavzioni che hanno portato alla realizzazione del testo, rivolto prevalentemente agli studenti e specializzandi in Medicina Veterinaria, le modalità con cui è stato concepito in accordo con le indicazioni dell'EAEVE (European Association of Establisments for Veterinary Education
BoHV-4 infection in Mediterranean buffalo (Bubalus bubalis): a sero-epidemiological and re-activation study
No full text
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
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