Abstract
Background: Bovine herpes virus 5 (BoHV-5) is a neurovirulent alpha herpes virus that causes fatal meningoencephalitis and huge economic losses in the livestock and associated industries worldwide; its diagnosis in the laboratory is essential for disease control, immunologic surveillance and effective monitoring programs in endemic areas. Materials and Methods: In this study, brain samples from 21 Colombian cattle that died of neurological disease, were negative for rabies and were diagnosed with nonspecific encephalitis were processed by real-time PCR (qPCR) in the laboratory of virology at the Institute of Biosciences, Sao Paulo State University, Brazil, to detect BoHV-5 genetic material in tissue preserved in paraffin blocks. Tissues were considered positive for BoHV-5 if amplii¬Âcation occurred at or before 30 PCR cycles, inconclusive if amplification occurred between 30 and 40 cycles and negative otherwise. Results and Conclusion: Two cases were positive, demonstrating that qPCR may be useful for confirming herpes encephalitis in acid formalin-fixed tissues with an inconclusive diagnosis.
Highlights
Bovine herpes virus 5 (BoHV-5) is a neurovirulent alpha herpes virus that causes fatal meningoencephalitis and huge economic losses in the livestock and associated industries worldwide; its diagnosis in the laboratory is essential for disease control, immunologic surveillance and effective monitoring programs in endemic areas
The Us9 protein of bovine herpes virus 1 (BoHV-1) is crucial for reactivation in the trigeminal ganglia, and the same protein in BoHV-5 has an important role in viral transport from olfactory receptor neurons to the olfactory bulb [9]
BoHV-5 DNA was detected by Real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) (qPCR) in two samples among all of the cases analyzed, demonstrating the usefulness of this technique as an aid in the diagnosis of BoHV infection in cattle with clinical symptoms of neurological disease, even in samples that are stored in acid formalin for long periods
Summary
Bovine herpes virus 5 (BoHV-5) is a neurovirulent alpha herpes virus that causes fatal meningoencephalitis and huge economic losses in the livestock and associated industries worldwide; its diagnosis in the laboratory is essential for disease control, immunologic surveillance and effective monitoring programs in endemic areas. The gC protein has been associated with the introduction of the virus in the brain, and gD is the receptor that facilitates binding to the host cell, initiating a replication process similar to those of other alpha herpes viruses [4,5,6,7,8]. Present in both BoHV-1 and BoHV-5, the gE amino acid sequence differs significantly between these viruses, causing a major difference in the nervous system invasion pattern and latency of BoHV-1 and BoHV-5 [4,6]. A viral neutralization test against BoHV1 can be useful for suspected infection with BoHV-5 [10]; because they share many structural, biological, antigenic and molecular characteristics, cross-reactions may occur between the two viruses, which hinder the evaluation of their serological prevalence [11,12,13]
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