(C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.”
“Viral diseases of psittacine birds are detected presently by PCR. However, conventional PCR methods are not quantitative and the products can sometimes include non-specific products of the same size. To avoid
these problems, real-time PCR assays based on the SYBR Green assay system were developed for the detection buy 10058-F4 and quantitation of four virus diseases of psittacine birds: psittacine beak and feather disease, avian polyomavirus infection, psittacid herpesvirus infection. and psittacine adenovirus infection. Up to 1 x 10(2) copies of virus DNA were detected, indicating that these assays are as sensitive as conventional PCR assays. The assays are specific because they did not Selleck Ro 61-8048 amplify any other pathogens including other viruses, bacteria, and fungi in psittacine birds. The assays measured successfully virus loads in clinical samples (blood, feathers, and tissues),
showing that these specimens were suitable targets for the detection and quantitation of viral DNA in psittacine birds. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.”
“An H5N1 avian influenza virus (AIV) hemagglutinin (HA) protein pseudotyped lentivirus, HIV/H5-HA, was generated, characterized in vitro and evaluated for its ability to induce protective immunity against virulent wild type AIV in mice. The HIV/H5-HA virus was able to infect 293T, BHK, Vero, PK-15, MDCK cells but not IBRS-2 cells and therefore demonstrated cell tropism similar to the wild type AIV. HIV/H5-HA agglutinated chicken erythrocytes and cell entry was blocked by ammonium chloride, indicating that the process is pH-dependent. In mice, HIV/H5-HA immunization resulted in low levels of virus in the lungs, elicited high levels of AIV HA-specific antibody as
indicated by the hemagglutination inhibition (HI) test, and the antibody induction was both earlier and with a higher titer than that induced by the inactivated AIV vaccine. These results confirmed the roles played by HA in AIV infection and immunogenicity and suggested that the pseudotyped lentivirus is a good model for studying the functions of AIV HA. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.”
“Real-time PCR hybridization probe sets were tested for the specific detection of amplified genome BGJ398 segment 2 cDNA from all nine serotypes of African horsesickness virus (AHSV). The hybridization probes were derived from the sequences of genome segments 2 of the nine reference strains of the virus and were designed to have clearly distinguishable peak melting temperatures. Viral dsRNA from each of the serotypes was specifically detected after reverse transcription, real-time PCR and melting curve analysis. The method was used to successfully serotype a range of field isolates, although most of the these showed peak melting temperature shifts.