Cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) boll rotting bacteria vectored by the brown stink bug, Euschistus servus (Say) (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae).

AIM: To determine the capacity of the brown stink bug (BSB) (Euschistus servus) to transmit an infective Pantoea agglomerans strain Sc 1-R into cotton (Gossypium hirsutum) bolls. METHODS AND RESULTS: A laboratory colony of BSB was maintained on fresh green beans. Either sterile or Sc 1-R contaminated beans were offered to adult insects. Strain Sc 1-R holds rifampicin resistance (Rif(r) ). Insects were then caged with unopened greenhouse-grown bolls. After 2 days, BSB were surface sterilized, ground, and then plated on media with and without Rif. Two weeks later, seed with lint were ground and plated on media with and without Rif. Microbes were recovered on nonselective media from all BSBs and from seed/lint at concentrations reaching 10(9)  CFU g(-1) tissue. Rif(r) bacteria were recovered strictly from insects exposed to Sc1-R and from diseased seed/lint of respective bolls. CONCLUSIONS: Euschistus servus was capable of transmitting strain Sc 1-R into bolls resulting in disease. Insects not exposed to the pathogen deposited bacteria yet the nonpathogenic microbes produced insignificant damage to the boll tissue. SIGNIFICANCE AND IMPACT OF STUDY: This is the first study to concretely show the capacity of the BSB to transmit an infective P. agglomerans strain resulting in boll disease.

Selection for pro-inflammatory mediators produces chickens more resistant to Clostridium perfringens-induced necrotic enteritis.

We developed a novel selection method based on an inherently high and low phenotype of pro-inflammatory mediators and produced "high" and "low" line chickens. We have shown high line birds are more resistant to Salmonella enterica serovar Enteritidis and Eimeria tenella compared to the low line. Clostridium perfringens is the fourth leading cause of bacterial-induced foodborne illness, and is also an economically important poultry pathogen and known etiologic agent of necrotic enteritis (NE). The objective of this study was to determine if high line birds were also more resistant to NE than low line birds using an established model. Birds were reared in floor pens and challenges were conducted twice (high line = 25/trial, 50 birds total; low line = 26/trial, 52 birds total). Day-old chicks were provided a 55% wheat-corn-based un-medicated starter diet. A bursal disease vaccine was administered at 10× the recommended dose via the ocular route at 14-d-of-age. Birds were challenged daily for 3 d beginning at 16-d-of-age by oral gavage (3 mL) with 10(7) colony forming units (cfu) of C. perfringens/mL then necropsied at 21-d-of-age. All birds had sections of the intestine examined and scored for lesions while the first 10 necropsied also had gut content collected for C. perfringens enumeration. Chickens from the high line were more resistant to C. perfringens-induced NE pathology compared to the low line, as indicated by reduced lesion scores. Ninety percent of the high line birds had lesions of zero or one compared to 67% of the low line birds. Wilcoxon rank sum test showed significantly higher lesion scores in the low line birds compared to the high line (P < 0.0001). There were no differences in the C. perfringens recovered (P = 0.83). These data provide additional validation and support selection based on elevated levels of pro-inflammatory mediators produces chickens with increased resistance against foodborne and poultry pathogens.

Loxoribine pretreatment reduces Salmonella Enteritidis organ invasion in 1-day-old chickens.

Young poultry exhibit a transient colonization by some food-borne pathogens, including Salmonella, during the first week of life that stems from immature innate and acquired defense mechanisms. Consequently, modulation of the hosts' natural immune response is emerging as an important area of interest for food animal producers, including the poultry industry. Toll-like receptor (TLR) agonists have been shown to boost the innate immune response in young chickens and increase their resistance to colonization by Salmonella enterica serovar Enteritidis. The objective of the present study was to determine if pretreatment with loxoribine, a TLR7 agonist and immune modulator, protects young chicks from Salmonella Enteritidis organ invasion. Loxoribine (0-100 µg) was administered intra-abdominally to 1-d-old broiler chicks, and 4 h later, the birds were challenged orally with Salmonella Enteritidis. Twenty-four hours postchallenge, birds were euthanized and the liver and spleen aseptically removed and cultured for Salmonella Enteritidis. This was carried out on 3 separate occasions using 26 to 50 chicks per dose per experiment. Pretreatment of chicks with loxoribine (6.25-25 µg) significantly (P ≤ 0.05) reduced liver and spleen organ invasion by Salmonella Enteritidis. Higher doses (50-100 µg) of loxoribine had no effect. The results obtained in this study indicate that there is a potential application for using loxoribine to increase protection of young chicks when they are most susceptible to infections with Salmonella.

Evaluation of the effect of gallium maltolate on fecal Salmonella shedding in cattle.

Strategies aimed at reducing fecal shedding of Salmonella and other foodborne pathogens may be effective for limiting transmission of pathogens from food animals to humans. The objective of this study was to determine the effectiveness of gallium maltolate (GaM) against Salmonella in vitro and to determine whether oral administration of GaM would reduce fecal shedding of Salmonella in cattle. Gallium is a semimetal exhibiting antimicrobial properties against some pathogenic bacteria, including Salmonella, by exploiting their need for iron to survive and replicate. In vitro growth studies were performed in pure cultures of Salmonella and in mixed cultures from ruminal fluid. Inclusion of GaM in culture medium or in mixed cultures of ruminal fluid resulted in a significant reduction in growth of Salmonella, suggesting that GaM may be effective for limiting growth and survival in vivo. Therefore, we subsequently administered two doses of GaM to Holstein steers, experimentally infected them with Salmonella, and quantitatively and qualitatively monitored fecal shedding at 12-h intervals. Sixty hours after beginning treatment, cattle were euthanized, and luminal contents and tissue were aseptically harvested from the rumen, jejunum, spiral colon, cecum, and rectum. The luminal contents were processed for quantitative and qualitative analysis of the challenge strains of Salmonella, and tissue samples were enriched and plated for qualitative analysis. We found no significant differences between control and treated animals in quantitative levels of Salmonella in the feces or the luminal contents. Likewise, we observed no pattern between control and treated animals in the frequency of positive or negative results from enriched feces, luminal contents, or tissue samples. These results suggest that GaM was not effective for reducing Salmonella in cattle.

Broiler breeders with an efficient innate immune response are more resistant to Eimeria tenella.

In previous studies we characterized the innate immune response of 2 parental broiler lines (A and B) and compared their resistance against Salmonella, Enterococcus, and Campylobacter challenges. In all cases, line A was more responsive and more resistant than line B. In the present study, we sought to determine whether this trend was also observed following challenge with the protozoan parasite Eimeria tenella. In 3 separate experiments, 14-d-old chickens from lines A and B were challenged orally with 15 to 50 × 10(3) E. tenella oocysts. Birds were killed 6 d postchallenge and the ceca was removed and scored for lesions and weight gain compared with noninfected controls. Line A birds were more resistant to intestinal pathology as demonstrated by lower lesion scores compared with line B birds. As might be expected, the lower lesion scores in line A chickens were often accompanied by higher weight gain compared with line B chickens, thus reducing potential revenue loss associated with low carcass weights often observed with coccidia-infected birds. The results from this study showed that in addition to having enhanced resistance against bacterial infections, line A chickens were also more resistant to coccidial infections compared with line B birds. Taken together with all of our earlier studies using these lines of birds, an efficient innate immune response protects against a broad range of foodborne and poultry pathogens, including costly coccidial infections.

In ovo treatment with CpG oligodeoxynucleotides decreases colonization of Salmonella enteriditis in broiler chickens.

Induction of the innate immune response in newly hatched chickens is important for limiting infections with bacteria, such as Salmonella enterica serovar Enteriditis (SE). CpG oligodeoxynucleotides (CpG-ODN) can stimulate the innate immune response of young chickens. Therefore, we examined the effectiveness of CpG-ODN administered in ovo on intestinal colonization by SE and the ability to modulate the function of heterophils in young chickens. Heterophils were isolated from 2-day-old chickens and were stimulated with heat-killed SE (HK-SE) or PMA for oxidative burst and HK-SE or live SE for degranulation assays. CpG-ODN treatment had no effect on heterophil oxidative burst when stimulated with HK-SE or PMA. However, HK-SE and live SE increased degranulation (P<0.01) in heterophils from CpG-ODN-treated birds compared to PBS-treated controls. In a second experiment, chickens were orally infected with SE on day 10 post-hatch and cecal contents were collected 6 days later for assessment of SE intestinal colonization. CpG-ODN treatment reduced SE colonization by greater than 10-fold (P<0.001) compared to PBS-injected control birds. Overall, we show for the first time that CpG-ODN given in ovo stimulates innate immune responsiveness of chicken heterophils and increases resistance of young chickens to SE colonization.

A genome assembly-integrated dog 1 Mb BAC microarray: a cytogenetic resource for canine cancer studies and comparative genomic analysis.

Molecular cytogenetic studies have been instrumental in defining the nature of numerical and structural chromosome changes in human cancers, but their significance remains to be fully understood. The emergence of high quality genome assemblies for several model organisms provides exciting opportunities to develop novel genome-integrated molecular cytogenetic resources that now permit a comparative approach to evaluating the relevance of tumor-associated chromosome aberrations, both within and between species. We have used the dog genome sequence assembly to identify a framework panel of 2,097 bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) clones, selected at intervals of approximately one megabase. Each clone has been evaluated by multicolor fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) to confirm its unique cytogenetic location in concordance with its reported position in the genome assembly, providing new information on the organization of the dog genome. This panel of BAC clones also represents a powerful cytogenetic resource with numerous potential applications. We have used the clone set to develop a genome-wide microarray for comparative genomic hybridization (aCGH) analysis, and demonstrate its application in detection of tumor-associated DNA copy number aberrations (CNAs) including single copy deletions and amplifications, regional aneuploidy and whole chromosome aneuploidy. We also show how individual clones selected from the BAC panel can be used as FISH probes in direct evaluation of tumor karyotypes, to verify and explore CNAs detected using aCGH analysis. This cytogenetically validated, genome integrated BAC clone panel has enormous potential for aiding gene discovery through a comparative approach to molecular oncology.

Dietary lactose and its effect on the disease condition of necrotic enteritis.

Clostridium perfringens is the etiologic agent of necrotic enteritis (NE) and is ubiquitous in nature. The incidence of NE has increased in countries and commercial companies that have stopped using antibiotic growth promoters. The mechanisms of colonization of C. perfringens and the factors involved in onset of NE are not fully understood. Previously, our laboratory has demonstrated that lactose could potentially reduce Salmonella and C. perfringens in ceca of poultry. In the present investigation, we hypothesized that dietary lactose would reduce the clinical signs of NE and could be used as an alternative to antibiotics. In experiment 1, day-of-hatch broilers were fed either a nonlactose control diet, a diet with 2.5% lactose, or a diet with 4.5% lactose throughout the experiment. Birds were administered C. perfringens (10(7) cfu/mL) daily via oral gavage for 3 consecutive days starting on d 17. When evaluating the intestinal lesions associated with NE, birds fed 2.5% lactose had significantly lower (P < 0.05) lesion scores (0.70 +/- 0.52) compared with the control (1.55 +/- 0.52) or the 4.5% lactose (1.60 +/- 0.52). The data from the microbial analysis showed that the addition of lactose did not affect any bacterial populations when compared with the control birds that did not receive dietary lactose over the 21-d evaluation. The overall lesion scores in experiment 2 were significantly (P < 0.05) reduced in birds fed 2.5% lactose compared with the birds fed the control diet with mean lesion scores of 1.10 +/- 0.73 and 1.80 +/- 0.73, respectively. These experiments suggest that lactose could be used as a potential alternative to growth-promoting antibiotics to help control this costly disease.

Integrated cytogenetic BAC map of the genome of the gray, short-tailed opossum, Monodelphis domestica.

The generation of high-quality genome assemblies for numerous species is advancing at a rapid pace. As the number of genome assemblies increases, so does our ability to investigate genome relationships and their contributions to unraveling complex biological, evolutionary, and biomedical processes. A key process in the generation of a genome assembly is to determine and verify the precise physical location and order of the large sequence blocks (scaffolds) that result from the assembly. For organisms of relatively recent common ancestry this process may be achieved largely through comparative sequence alignment. However, as the evolutionary distance between species lengthens, the use of comparative sequence alignment becomes increasingly less reliable. Simultaneous cytogenetic mapping, using multicolor fluorescence in-situ hybridization (FISH) analysis, offers an alternative means to define the cytogenetic location and relative order of DNA sequences, thereby anchoring the genome sequence to the karyotype. In this article we report the molecular cytogenetic locations of 415 bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) clones that served to anchor sequence scaffolds of the gray, short-tailed opossum (Monodelphis domestica) to its karyotype, which enabled accurate integration of these regions into the genome assembly.

Effect of ionophore supplementation on the incidence of Escherichia coli O157:H7 and Salmonella and antimicrobial susceptibility of fecal coliforms in Stocker cattle.

To examine the effect of ionophore supplementation on fecal shedding of Escherichia coli O157:H7 and Salmonella, crossbred beef calves (n=113; mean body weight [BW], 243 kg) were fed a mineral supplement with ionophore (1.76 g lasalocid/kg) for 61 days (d). Control calves received an identical mineral supplement without lasalocid. Calves were pastured on fescue/bermudagrass paddocks and supplemented with a corn/wheat midds/soybean meal supplement (1.5% of BW/d). Upon arrival, cattle were fed a commercial receiving ration containing 1 g chlorotetracycline/kg for 10 d. Sick calves were administered one or a combination of the following: Nuflor (florfenicol), Baytril (eurofloxacin), Micotil (tilmicosin), or LA 200 (oxytetracycline). Fecal samples were collected immediately prior to ionophore supplementation, approximately midway and at the end of the experimental period (60 d total ionophore feeding) for isolation of E. coli O157:H7 and Salmonella. Putative fecal coliforms were also isolated at these sampling times and examined for antimicrobial susceptibility. The study was replicated over a two year period (year 1, n=53 head; year 2, n=60 head). Ionophore supplementation had no effect (p>0.10) on the incidence of calves shedding E. coli O157:H7 or Salmonella. The percentage of calves shedding E. coli O157:H7 varied throughout the experimental period from 0 to 30%, while Salmonella was cultured from only three calves over the 2-year experimental period. Antimicrobial susceptibility profiles of putative fecal coliforms were consistent with antibiotic treatments administered during the study (observed resistance to chlortetracycline, florfenicol, oxytetracycline), while only one treatment effect was observed. Ionophore treatment resulted in a significantly higher number of coliform isolates resistant to ampicillin compared to controls in year 1, but not year 2. A number of fecal coliform isolates demonstrated resistance to multiple antibiotics, however, this was not affected (p>0.10) by ionophore supplementation. Mineral intakes, BW gain, and the number of sick calves were similar (p>0.10) among treatments. Ionophore supplementation had no affect on fecal shedding of E. coli O157:H7 or Salmonella and a negligible impact on antimicrobial susceptibility patterns of fecal coliforms in beef calves.

Effect of water sprinkling on incidence of zoonotic pathogens in feedlot cattle.

Heat stress and dusty conditions are common challenges for cattle during the summer, and a typical method of alleviating these problems involves sprinkling cattle and pens with water. The effect of sprinkling water on the incidence of zoonotic pathogens has not been previously studied. Four pens of heifers (n = 41) were cooled using sprinklers, and four pens (n = 43) served as controls. Heifers were crossbred Charolais, with white and red hair coats. Sprinkling was initiated when cattle were on full concentrate feed (July). Fecal samples, hide swipes, and BW were collected on d 0, 28, 63, 95, and 98. Average daily gain, DMI, and G:F were calculated, and carcass traits were collected 36 h after processing. Performance data were analyzed as a randomized complete block design, and zoonotic pathogen data were analyzed using chi2 analysis. Sprinkling tended (P = 0.054) to increase the incidence of fecal Salmonella spp. populations on d 98, but simultaneously tended to decrease (P = 0.058) the Escherichia coli O157:H7 incidence on hides on d 98. The most prevalent Salmonella serovars in this study were Kentucky, Muenster, Meleagridis, and Cerro. Performance measures and carcass traits did not differ between treatments (P > 0.10). Under our conditions, sprinkling cattle with water did not affect the incidence of zoonotic pathogens in feces or on hides.

The vertical dimensional change resulting from polishing or glazing porcelain.

Studies have shown that polishing porcelain can produce a smooth surface similar to that resulting from a natural glaze. It has been reported that glazing porcelain causes changes in the occlusal vertical dimension. This study evaluated the changes in vertical dimension after natural glazing and polishing procedures. Twenty uniform-size tricuspid porcelain-fused-to-metal crowns were constructed on a mandibular typodont tooth. A inch steel ball was cradled between the three cusps, and the occlusal vertical dimension was measured from the top of the steel ball to the base of the castings. Contact areas were marked and lightly removed. Ten crowns received natural glazing and the remaining 10 were polished with a Shofu polishing kit. Measurements of occlusal vertical dimension were repeated. All of the crowns showed a loss of occlusal vertical dimension. The mean loss for polished crowns was significantly higher than that recorded for the glazed crowns.