Heat Inactivation of a Duck Adenovirus Serologically Indistinguishable from Adenovirus 127

Abstract

Egg-drop syndrome 1976 (EDS-76), first reported in the Netherlands in late 1976 (10) and seen since in Ireland (5,6) and Japan (12,13), is a disease characterized by depressed egg production in chickens, loss of shell pigmentation, and soft-shelled or shell-less eggs (5,6,10,12,13). Several hemagglutinating adenovirus isolates have been associated with EDS-76, including isolate 127 (6), BC-14 (3), and JPA-1 (13). In the United States, hemagglutinating adenoviruses have been isolated from clinically normal ducks (2,11). These isolates have been shown to be serologically indistinguishable from the agents known to cause EDS (2,11). It has been shown in our laboratory that the Cornell isolate of duck adenovirus (DAV) does not replicate and produce hemagglutinating (HA) activity in chicken embryo liver cell cultures (4), which is in contrast to the European isolates (6,9,13) and one other domestic isolate (11). It was of interest, therefore, to investigate other possible differences of the Cornell DAV.