[West-Nile-Virus infections in 12 horses in east-central Germany]. / West-Nil-Virus-Infektion bei 12 Pferden in Mitteldeutschland.

PURPOSE AND AIM: The presenting complaints, clinical signs, diagnostic evaluation, therapy, and outcome of 12 horses with clinically apparent West-Nile-Virus (WNV) infection are described. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Case series RESULTS: The adult horses (age 6-18 years, 7 mares, 5 geldings) from Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt were presented with various clinical histories between September 2018 and September 2020. All horses were presented in August or September and no horse was vaccinated against WNV. Fever as the most common general clinical sign was present in 8/12 horses. The most common neurological signs were muscle fasciculations (11/12 horses), ataxia (8/12 horses), hyperesthesia and head tilt (6/12 horses each). Diagnosis of WNV infection was confirmed by demonstrating IgM antibody and neutralizing antibody production in all horses; 2 euthanized horses also tested positive by PCR. Therapy was symptomatic and primarily included non-steroidal anti-inflammatories or dexamethasone as well as fluid therapy. Duration of hospitalization was 7.5 days on average. According to their owners, seven horses recovered completely, while information was missing for 2 horses. CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL RELEVANCE: In eastern-central Germany, WNV-encephalomyelitis must be considered a differential diagnosis for unvaccinated horses with acute neurologic disease occurring in summer and late summer. The reported clinical signs and the outcome of therapy are mostly congruent with reports from North America and other European countries.

Generation and first characterization of TRDC-knockout pigs lacking γδ T cells.

The TRDC-locus encodes the T cell receptor delta constant region, one component of the γδ T cell receptor which is essential for development of γδ T cells. In contrast to peptide recognition by αß T cells, antigens activating γδ T cells are mostly MHC independent and not well characterized. Therefore, the function of γδ T cells and their contribution to protection against infections is still unclear. Higher numbers of circulating γδ T cells compared to mice, render the pig a suitable animal model to study γδ T cells. Knocking-out the porcine TRDC-locus by intracytoplasmic microinjection and somatic cell nuclear transfer resulted in healthy living γδ T cell deficient offspring. Flow cytometric analysis revealed that TRDC-KO pigs lack γδ T cells in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) and spleen cells. The composition of the remaining leucocyte subpopulations was not affected by the depletion of γδ T cells. Genome-wide transcriptome analyses in PBMC revealed a pattern of changes reflecting the impairment of known or expected γδ T cell dependent pathways. Histopathology did not reveal developmental abnormalities of secondary lymphoid tissues. However, in a vaccination experiment the KO pigs stayed healthy but had a significantly lower neutralizing antibody titer as the syngenic controls.