Friday, April 15, 2016

Whole Blood Gene Expression Profiling in Preclinical and Clinical Cattle Infected with Atypical Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy

Whole Blood Gene Expression Profiling in Preclinical and Clinical Cattle Infected with Atypical Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy

 

Elena Xerxa, Maura Barbisin, Maria Novella Chieppa, Helena Krmac, Elena Vallino Costassa, Paolo Vatta, Marion Simmons, Maria Caramelli, Cristina Casalone, Cristiano Corona, Giuseppe Legname

 

PLOS

 

Published: April 13, 2016 • http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0153425

 

Abstract

 

Prion diseases, such as bovine spongiform encephalopathies (BSE), are transmissible neurodegenerative disorders affecting humans and a wide variety of mammals. Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), a prion disease in humans, has been linked to exposure to BSE prions. This classical BSE (cBSE) is now rapidly disappearing as a result of appropriate measures to control animal feeding. Besides cBSE, two atypical forms (named H- and L-type BSE) have recently been described in Europe, Japan, and North America. Here we describe the first wide-spectrum microarray analysis in whole blood of atypical BSE-infected cattle. Transcriptome changes in infected animals were analyzed prior to and after the onset of clinical signs. The microarray analysis revealed gene expression changes in blood prior to the appearance of the clinical signs and during the progression of the disease. A set of 32 differentially expressed genes was found to be in common between clinical and preclinical stages and showed a very similar expression pattern in the two phases. A 22-gene signature showed an oscillating pattern of expression, being differentially expressed in the preclinical stage and then going back to control levels in the symptomatic phase. One gene, SEL1L3, was downregulated during the progression of the disease. Most of the studies performed up to date utilized various tissues, which are not suitable for a rapid analysis of infected animals and patients. Our findings suggest the intriguing possibility to take advantage of whole blood RNA transcriptional profiling for the preclinical identification of prion infection. Further, this study highlighted several pathways, such as immune response and metabolism that may play an important role in peripheral prion pathogenesis. Finally, the gene expression changes identified in the present study may be further investigated as a fingerprint for monitoring the progression of disease and for developing targeted therapeutic interventions.

 

snip...

 

Discussion Whole blood is the most suitable tissue for a prospective rapid diagnostic test since it minimizes sample handling artifacts and reduces sample variability due to fractionation. The present study revealed a substantial gene expression alteration in whole blood from atypical BSE-infected cattle, which could be investigated in future experiments and, if confirmed, could be exploited as a signature for the disease. One of the major caveats in using peripheral blood is that its cellular components may change dramatically during infections or inflammation. The animals used in the present study did not show any apparent side pathology, they were monitored daily by the husbandry staff and their blood was examined for serum aspartate aminotransferase (AST), creatine kinase (CK) and manganese [23]. Nonetheless, possible interference due to hidden pathologies or to inter-individual variations in hematocrit and white blood cell count may affect interpretation of expression data and should be considered as an important variable in future studies. In light of this, the present results should be read as a first exploration of whole blood transcriptomics during a prion infection. To our knowledge, this is the first microarray study of whole blood from BSE-infected cattle. Indeed, in a study published by Panelli et al. [36], fractionated white blood cells were analyzed to detect gene expression changes in L-type infected animals. Very few DEGs are common between the two studies. However, this discrepancy may be explained by different infection methods, microarray platforms, statistical analysis stringency and p value cut-off. Also, the white cells used in the study of Panelli et al. were isolated from 1 year post-infection animals, while in our study we used whole blood from preclinical and clinical infected cattle (around 6 months and 22–26 post-infection respectively).

 

In the present study, 4 statistical comparisons were performed: infected (preclinical and clinical) versus control (IvsCtrl), preclinical versus control (PvsCtrl), clinical versus control (CvsCtrl) and clinical versus preclinical (CvsP) comparisons. Since our goal was to find a common pattern among all the atypical BSE-infected cattle, we defined them as a single group of infected (H-type and L-type) animals. Indeed, as published by Konold and colleagues [23], these animals shared a very similar phenotype in terms of behavioral and clinical signs. Also, another study by Priemer and colleagues indicated a large similarity at level of PrPSc anatomical distribution for the atypical strains, with only slight differences in the overall intensities between H- and L-type [27]. Nonetheless, even if H- and L-type BSE are reported to share many similarities, they constitute two distinct BSE variants which are characterized by a different electrophoretic mobility of PrPSc unglycosylated moiety after proteinase K (PK) digestion [16, 18]. Statistical comparison between the 4 H-type and the 4 L-type infected animals was carried out in preliminary analyses (see S4 Table), but only a limited number of DEGs was found. Among them, only 15 had a p value lower than 0.01 and only 16 showed a fold change higher than 3, indicating that, at least in terms of number of DEGs, these two groups did not display large differences. For these reasons, we decided to focus our attention on finding a common gene pattern among all the atypical BSE-infected cattle and therefore we pooled the two groups. Due to the high inter-animal variability, which is expected for outbreed animals, further studies in larger animal cohorts would be required to investigate in detail the strain-specific gene expression changes occurring during the progression of the disease. Still, the HvsL analysis can be used as a sort of internal control in this study.

 

Another aspect to be taken into account when reading the present results is that additional negative control cattle, aged from 12 to 37 months and derived from a different herd compared to the Konold’s study groups [23], were introduced in the analyses. The addition of these controls was useful to balance the samples from infected animals and allowed a preliminary exploration of the differentially expressed transcripts. However, age-related and environmental variability may have affected in some degree the data and need to be considered for their correct interpretation. Despite some limitations, since several statistical analyses were performed (including the CvsP analysis, in which all the animals derived from the same herd) a cross comparison of all them, as we did with the Venn Diagram, may be very useful in order to define a set of genes which could be a good starting point for further validation experiments in the future. In the first statistical analysis we performed (IvsC), we found that among 101 DEGs, 93 had known functions and were involved in several biological processes and molecular pathways, such as autoimmune thyroiditis, chemokine and cytokine activity, regulation of the secretion pathway, the immune system and antigen presentation[52]. Previous studies on CNS tissues from BSE-infected animals also showed the involvement of many of these pathways in prion pathogenesis [4, 35, 52]. This similarity between brain and blood may not be surprising, since it has been shown in the literature that blood transcriptome analyses identify genes that are relevant to the pathological processes occurring in the CNS [53]. Indeed, measuring disease-related gene expression in peripheral blood may be a useful proxy measure for gene expression in the CNS [53, 54].

 

To characterize the gene expression profile in the preclinical and clinical stages, we performed the PvsCtrl and the CvsCtrl statistical comparisons. We found that 113 probe sets were differentially regulated in the preclinical stage of the disease, while 207 probe sets had an altered expression in the clinical phase. Importantly, the present results indicated that, at least in blood, a consistent gene expression alteration is present from the early stages of the disease. This finding is in agreement with microarray analysis carried out by Tang et al., which revealed the highest degree of differential gene regulation in brains of cBSE-infected cattle at 21 months post infection, which is prior to the detection of infectivity [4]. Also, Tortosa and colleagues found a significant number of DEGs at early stages of the disease in the CNS from cBSE-infected transgenic mice [52].

 

Venn diagram analysis revealed that 32 DEGs were in common between the clinical and preclinical groups and, remarkably, they had a very similar pattern of expression in both stages of the disease. Since these genes are altered in both phases, it would be very interesting to confirm their differential expression in future experiments with additional negative controls, and eventually in blood from human patients.

 

Based on GO enrichment analysis, we found that immunity and inflammation processes were strongly involved during the progression of the disease stages. Interestingly, we found that antigen processing and presentation via MHC (major histocompatibility complex) molecules and the autoimmune thyroiditis pathway were significantly altered in atypical BSE-challenged animals. The majority of MHC class I molecule coding-genes were down-regulated in infected cattle (three out of four probes) and, also, MHC class II molecule coding transcripts were found to be down-regulated during the progression of the clinical signs (four out of four probes were down-regulated in the CvsP comparison). The involvement of MHC transcripts in prion pathogenesis is supported by another microarray study published by Khaniya and colleagues in 2009 [55]. In line with the trend found by the microarray analysis, the RT-qPCR validation experiments indicated a downregulation for MHC class I heavy chain (BOLA), even though the results failed to reach the statistical significance (data not shown).

 

Regarding the autoimmune thyroiditis pathway, it is well known in the literature that Hashimoto’s encephalitis, together with the associated thyroiditis, is a differential diagnosis for CJD, since the two pathologies share a very similar clinical symptomatology [56]. As hypothesized previously by Prusiner and colleagues, the clinical and neuropathological similarities between CJD and Hashimoto’s thyroiditis raise the possibility that protein misprocessing may underlie both neurodegenerative and autoimmune diseases [57].

 

Finally, a fourth statistical analysis was performed to identify any specific changes between the clinical and the preclinical stages of disease (CvsP). Indeed, we found that the last phases of the disease are accompanied by the overactivation of several genes involved in the immune defense response. In particular, the shift from the preclinical towards the clinical stage was characterized by the upregulation of genes involved in B cell proliferation and the ISG15 (IFN-induced 15-kDa protein) conjugation system. ISG15 is a ubiquitin-like molecule that is tightly regulated by specific innate immunity signaling pathways [58]. Interestingly, it has been shown in the literature that this protein is over-activated in the spinal cord of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis mice models [59] and it has been indicated as a general marker for both acute and chronic neuronal injuries [60].

 

To further analyze the data, we compared the list of DEGs found in PvsCtrl, CvsP and CvsCtrl and found 22 genes with an oscillatory pattern of expression, being differentially expressed in the preclinical stage and then going back roughly to the control level in the clinical stage. Interestingly, some of the oscillatory DEGs are involved in regulation of transcription, thus suggesting that the gene expression during atypical BSE infection is tightly regulated. Venn diagram analysis revealed that one gene, SEL1L3, was down-regulated in all the comparisons (PvsCtrl, CvsCtrl, CvsP). SEL1L3 codes for a transmembrane protein whose function is unknown. Interestingly, an important paralog of SEL1L3, SEL1L, is involved in the retrotranslocation of misfolded proteins from the lumen of the endoplasmic reticulum to the cytosol, where they are degraded by the proteasome in an ubiquitin-dependent manner [61]. Therefore, we could hypothesize that its down-regulation in prion infected animals would lead to a reduced degradation of PrPSc, thus supporting the progression of the disease. We validated this gene by RT-qPCR, confirming its downregulation in both the preclinical and clinical stages of the disease. Further investigation on the function of SEL1L3L would be of great interest since this gene may play an important role in prion disease and maybe other neurodegenerative illnesses.

 

Besides SEL1L3, five other genes were validated by RT-qPCR; here we will briefly discuss how these genes may be involved in prion pathogenesis and in host response to prion infection.

 

GNLY and CD40L were found to be down-regulated in both preclinical and clinical stages. GNLY is a powerful antimicrobial protein contained within the granules of cytotoxic T lymphocyte and natural killer cells. This gene was found to be downregulated also in a microarray study performed on the medulla oblongata from sheep with preclinical natural scrapie [62]. Thus, it may be a good candidate as an early biomarker for atypical BSE but also for other prion diseases.

 

CD40–CD40L interactions mediate a broad variety of immune and inflammatory responses and have been implicated in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) [63, 64]. Although the importance of CD40L in prion disease progression has not yet been clarified (66–68), its downregulation in blood during both preclinical and clinical stages of atypical BSE-infection suggests that prion infection has an impact on the host immune system response and that immune tolerance may be an active process induced by prions.

 

Two other downregulated genes were validated by RT-qPCR, namely HBA2 and XIST. Concerning HBA2, we found a downregulation in preclinical atypical BSE-infected cattle. Haemoglobins are iron-containing proteins that transport oxygen in the blood of most vertebrates. Beside blood, HBA and HBB are also expressed in mesencephalic dopaminergic neurons and glial cells [65] and are down regulated in AD, PD and other neurodegenerative diseases [66]. Haemoglobin genes expression alteration during preclinical scrapie was also found in the spleen and CNS of infected animals [67, 68], as well as in the brains of nonhuman primates infected with BSE [51]. These findings suggest an involvement of these genes in the host response to general neurodegenerative processes. Besides changes in transcript levels, it has been found that both HbA and HbB protein distribution is altered in mitochondrial fractions from PD degenerating brain [69]. Moreover, HbA is also expressed in endothelial cells, where it regulates the nitric oxide signaling [70]. Even though a clear mechanism linking these molecules to neurodegeneration has not yet been described, taken together these findings strongly suggest a central role for haemoglobin in neurodegenerative processes.

 

A marked downregulation in XIST expression was found in our infected animals. XIST is a gene located on X chromosomes which codes for a long non-coding RNA (LncRNA) involved in X-chromosome dosage control [71, 72]. LncRNAs are emerging as useful biomarkers for neurodegenerative diseases such as AD [73] and other disease processes [74], and they can be easily detected in blood and urine from patients. In addition, we cannot exclude the possibility that the alteration in XIST expression may have some role in gender-dependent response to prion infection [75].

 

RT-qPCR experiments confirmed the upregulation of PDK4 in clinically affected animals. PDK4 encodes for a mitochondrial protein involved in glucose metabolism through the inhibition of pyruvate dehydrogenase complex, which leads to a reduction in pyruvate conversion to acetyl-CoA [76]. In the literature, a key role has been suggested for acetyl-CoA fueling for the survival of cholinergic neurons in the course of neurodegenerative diseases [77]. PDK4 overactivation can lead to a switch from glucose catabolism to fatty acid utilization [78], thus increasing the production of ketone bodies. Notably, it has been shown in the literature that these molecules are able to cross the blood brain barrier. We could speculate that in prion infection (or at least in atypical BSE infection) the concentration of ketone bodies would rise in blood, as a consequence of PDK4 upregulation, and act in the brain as neuroprotective molecules [79, 80]. This would be an attempt by the organism to prevent the neurodegeneration induced by prions.

 

 snip...

 

 Conclusions In conclusion, the present study has led to the identification of several gene expression changes in whole blood from clinical and preclinical atypical BSE cattle, which upon further investigation and validation in blood from human patients, might represent a molecular fingerprint to characterize this disease. By comparing our results with other studies on various animal prion diseases, we observed that some of the most significantly altered DEGs we found in blood were found differentially expressed also in brain tissue from BSE-infected cattle; this observation indicates that whole blood transcriptome analyses may serve as a proxy measure for the changes occurring in the CNS of infected animals. Furthermore, our study underlines the importance of utilizing whole blood, without any additional manipulation, as a source tissue as it is an easily accessible body fluid. In addition, the transcription regulation activated in atypical BSE infections is similar to some extent to the one observed in the literature for cBSE, even though the clinical characteristics and biochemical properties are very different. Thus, this gene expression profile may be investigated in other BSE infections to identify a common molecular fingerprint.

 

Overall, our study confirmed the differential expression of 6 genes (XIST, CD40L, GNLY, PDK4, HBA2 and SEL1L3), which may play several roles in atypical BSE pathogenesis and, possibly, in other prion infections. Indeed, they are involved in multiple pathways such as immune response, inflammation, and glucose catabolism. Even though further studies are required to investigate the specific involvement of all the identified genes in prion diseases, our data indicate an important role for immune system regulation in the prion pathogenesis of atypical BSE and maybe in BSE as well as in other prion diseases in general.

 


 

Wednesday, September 23, 2015

 

NIH Availability for Licensing AGENCY: [FR Doc. 2015–24117 Filed 9–22–15; 8:45 am] Detection and Discrimination of Classical and Atypical L-Type BSE Strains by RT-QuIC

 


 

Monday, March 19, 2012

 

Infectivity in Skeletal Muscle of Cattle with Atypical Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy PLoS One. 2012; 7(2): e31449.

 


 

2015-2016

 

***********OCTOBER 2015*************

 

*** PRION 2015 ORAL AND POSTER CONGRESSIONAL ABSTRACTS ***

 

THANK YOU PRION 2015 TAYLOR & FRANCIS, Professor Chernoff, and Professor Aguzzi et al, for making these PRION 2015 Congressional Poster and Oral Abstracts available freely to the public. ...Terry S. Singeltary Sr.

 

O.05: Transmission of prions to primates after extended silent incubation periods: Implications for BSE and scrapie risk assessment in human populations

 

Emmanuel Comoy, Jacqueline Mikol, Val erie Durand, Sophie Luccantoni, Evelyne Correia, Nathalie Lescoutra, Capucine Dehen, and Jean-Philippe Deslys Atomic Energy Commission; Fontenay-aux-Roses, France

 

Prion diseases (PD) are the unique neurodegenerative proteinopathies reputed to be transmissible under field conditions since decades. The transmission of Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) to humans evidenced that an animal PD might be zoonotic under appropriate conditions. Contrarily, in the absence of obvious (epidemiological or experimental) elements supporting a transmission or genetic predispositions, PD, like the other proteinopathies, are reputed to occur spontaneously (atpical animal prion strains, sporadic CJD summing 80% of human prion cases). Non-human primate models provided the first evidences supporting the transmissibiity of human prion strains and the zoonotic potential of BSE. Among them, cynomolgus macaques brought major information for BSE risk assessment for human health (Chen, 2014), according to their phylogenetic proximity to humans and extended lifetime. We used this model to assess the zoonotic potential of other animal PD from bovine, ovine and cervid origins even after very long silent incubation periods. ***We recently observed the direct transmission of a natural classical scrapie isolate to macaque after a 10-year silent incubation period, with features similar to some reported for human cases of sporadic CJD, albeit requiring fourfold longe incubation than BSE. ***Scrapie, as recently evoked in humanized mice (Cassard, 2014), is the third potentially zoonotic PD (with BSE and L-type BSE), ***thus questioning the origin of human sporadic cases. We will present an updated panorama of our different transmission studies and discuss the implications of such extended incubation periods on risk assessment of animal PD for human health.

 

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***thus questioning the origin of human sporadic cases...

 

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***Our study demonstrates susceptibility of adult cattle to oral transmission of classical BSE. ***

 

***our findings suggest that possible transmission risk of H-type BSE to sheep and human. ***

 

P.86: Estimating the risk of transmission of BSE and scrapie to ruminants and humans by protein misfolding cyclic amplification

 

Morikazu Imamura, Naoko Tabeta, Yoshifumi Iwamaru, and Yuichi Murayama National Institute of Animal Health; Tsukuba, Japan

 

To assess the risk of the transmission of ruminant prions to ruminants and humans at the molecular level, we investigated the ability of abnormal prion protein (PrPSc) of typical and atypical BSEs (L-type and H-type) and typical scrapie to convert normal prion protein (PrPC) from bovine, ovine, and human to proteinase K-resistant PrPSc-like form (PrPres) using serial protein misfolding cyclic amplification (PMCA).

 

Six rounds of serial PMCA was performed using 10% brain homogenates from transgenic mice expressing bovine, ovine or human PrPC in combination with PrPSc seed from typical and atypical BSE- or typical scrapie-infected brain homogenates from native host species. In the conventional PMCA, the conversion of PrPC to PrPres was observed only when the species of PrPC source and PrPSc seed matched. However, in the PMCA with supplements (digitonin, synthetic polyA and heparin), both bovine and ovine PrPC were converted by PrPSc from all tested prion strains. On the other hand, human PrPC was converted by PrPSc from typical and H-type BSE in this PMCA condition.

 

Although these results were not compatible with the previous reports describing the lack of transmissibility of H-type BSE to ovine and human transgenic mice, ***our findings suggest that possible transmission risk of H-type BSE to sheep and human. Bioassay will be required to determine whether the PMCA products are infectious to these animals.

 

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***our findings suggest that possible transmission risk of H-type BSE to sheep and human. Bioassay will be required to determine whether the PMCA products are infectious to these animals.

 

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Research Project: TRANSMISSION, DIFFERENTIATION, AND PATHOBIOLOGY OF TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHIES

 

Title: Transmission of scrapie prions to primate after an extended silent incubation period

 

Authors

 

item Comoy, Emmanuel - item Mikol, Jacqueline - item Luccantoni-Freire, Sophie - item Correia, Evelyne - item Lescoutra-Etchegaray, Nathalie - item Durand, Valérie - item Dehen, Capucine - item Andreoletti, Olivier - item Casalone, Cristina - item Richt, Juergen item Greenlee, Justin item Baron, Thierry - item Benestad, Sylvie - item Hills, Bob - item Brown, Paul - item Deslys, Jean-Philippe -

 

Submitted to: Scientific Reports Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal Publication Acceptance Date: May 28, 2015 Publication Date: June 30, 2015 Citation: Comoy, E.E., Mikol, J., Luccantoni-Freire, S., Correia, E., Lescoutra-Etchegaray, N., Durand, V., Dehen, C., Andreoletti, O., Casalone, C., Richt, J.A., Greenlee, J.J., Baron, T., Benestad, S., Brown, P., Deslys, J. 2015. Transmission of scrapie prions to primate after an extended silent incubation period. Scientific Reports. 5:11573.

 

Interpretive Summary:

 

The transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (also called prion diseases) are fatal neurodegenerative diseases that affect animals and humans. The agent of prion diseases is a misfolded form of the prion protein that is resistant to breakdown by the host cells. Since all mammals express prion protein on the surface of various cells such as neurons, all mammals are, in theory, capable of replicating prion diseases. One example of a prion disease, bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE; also called mad cow disease), has been shown to infect cattle, sheep, exotic undulates, cats, non-human primates, and humans when the new host is exposed to feeds or foods contaminated with the disease agent. The purpose of this study was to test whether non-human primates (cynomologous macaque) are susceptible to the agent of sheep scrapie. After an incubation period of approximately 10 years a macaque developed progressive clinical signs suggestive of neurologic disease. Upon postmortem examination and microscopic examination of tissues, there was a widespread distribution of lesions consistent with a transmissible spongiform encephalopathy. This information will have a scientific impact since it is the first study that demonstrates the transmission of scrapie to a non-human primate with a close genetic relationship to humans. This information is especially useful to regulatory officials and those involved with risk assessment of the potential transmission of animal prion diseases to humans.

 

Technical Abstract:

 

Classical bovine spongiform encephalopathy (c-BSE) is an animal prion disease that also causes variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease in humans. Over the past decades, c-BSE's zoonotic potential has been the driving force in establishing extensive protective measures for animal and human health. In complement to the recent demonstration that humanized mice are susceptible to scrapie, we report here the first observation of direct transmission of a natural classical scrapie isolate to a macaque after a 10-year incubation period. Neuropathologic examination revealed all of the features of a prion disease: spongiform change, neuronal loss, and accumulation of PrPres throughout the CNS.

 

***This observation strengthens the questioning of the harmlessness of scrapie to humans, at a time when protective measures for human and animal health are being dismantled and reduced as c-BSE is considered controlled and being eradicated. Our results underscore the importance of precautionary and protective measures and the necessity for long-term experimental transmission studies to assess the zoonotic potential of other animal prion strains.

 


 

***This information will have a scientific impact since it is the first study that demonstrates the transmission of scrapie to a non-human primate with a close genetic relationship to humans. This information is especially useful to regulatory officials and those involved with risk assessment of the potential transmission of animal prion diseases to humans.

 

***This observation strengthens the questioning of the harmlessness of scrapie to humans, at a time when protective measures for human and animal health are being dismantled and reduced as c-BSE is considered controlled and being eradicated. Our results underscore the importance of precautionary and protective measures and the necessity for long-term experimental transmission studies to assess the zoonotic potential of other animal prion strains.

 


 

PRION 2015 CONFERENCE FT. COLLINS CWD RISK FACTORS TO HUMANS

 

*** LATE-BREAKING ABSTRACTS PRION 2015 CONFERENCE ***

 

O18

 

Zoonotic Potential of CWD Prions

 

Liuting Qing1, Ignazio Cali1,2, Jue Yuan1, Shenghai Huang3, Diane Kofskey1, Pierluigi Gambetti1, Wenquan Zou1, Qingzhong Kong1 1Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, USA, 2Second University of Naples, Naples, Italy, 3Encore Health Resources, Houston, Texas, USA

 

*** These results indicate that the CWD prion has the potential to infect human CNS and peripheral lymphoid tissues and that there might be asymptomatic human carriers of CWD infection.

 

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***These results indicate that the CWD prion has the potential to infect human CNS and peripheral lymphoid tissues and that there might be asymptomatic human carriers of CWD infection.***

 

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P.105: RT-QuIC models trans-species prion transmission

 

Kristen Davenport, Davin Henderson, Candace Mathiason, and Edward Hoover Prion Research Center; Colorado State University; Fort Collins, CO USA

 

Conversely, FSE maintained sufficient BSE characteristics to more efficiently convert bovine rPrP than feline rPrP. Additionally, human rPrP was competent for conversion by CWD and fCWD.

 

***This insinuates that, at the level of protein:protein interactions, the barrier preventing transmission of CWD to humans is less robust than previously estimated.

 

================

 

***This insinuates that, at the level of protein:protein interactions, the barrier preventing transmission of CWD to humans is less robust than previously estimated.***

 

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*** PRICE OF CWD TSE PRION POKER GOES UP 2014 ***

 

Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathy TSE PRION update January 2, 2014

 

*** chronic wasting disease, there was no absolute barrier to conversion of the human prion protein.

 

*** Furthermore, the form of human PrPres produced in this in vitro assay when seeded with CWD, resembles that found in the most common human prion disease, namely sCJD of the MM1 subtype.

 


 


 

*** These results would seem to suggest that CWD does indeed have zoonotic potential, at least as judged by the compatibility of CWD prions and their human PrPC target. Furthermore, extrapolation from this simple in vitro assay suggests that if zoonotic CWD occurred, it would most likely effect those of the PRNP codon 129-MM genotype and that the PrPres type would be similar to that found in the most common subtype of sCJD (MM1).***

 


 

*** The potential impact of prion diseases on human health was greatly magnified by the recognition that interspecies transfer of BSE to humans by beef ingestion resulted in vCJD. While changes in animal feed constituents and slaughter practices appear to have curtailed vCJD, there is concern that CWD of free-ranging deer and elk in the U.S. might also cross the species barrier. Thus, consuming venison could be a source of human prion disease. Whether BSE and CWD represent interspecies scrapie transfer or are newly arisen prion diseases is unknown. Therefore, the possibility of transmission of prion disease through other food animals cannot be ruled out. There is evidence that vCJD can be transmitted through blood transfusion. There is likely a pool of unknown size of asymptomatic individuals infected with vCJD, and there may be asymptomatic individuals infected with the CWD equivalent. These circumstances represent a potential threat to blood, blood products, and plasma supplies.

 


 

Tuesday, April 12, 2016

 

The first detection of Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) in Europe Norway

 


 

Thursday, January 29, 2015

 

Atypical H-TYPE BSE Case Confirmed in Norway

 


 

Monday, April 11, 2016

 

***DECLARATION OF EXTRAORDINARY EMERGENCY DUE TO A FOREIGN ANIMAL DISEASE TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHY TSE PRION CHRONIC WASTING DISEASE CWD IN THE UNITED STATES AND NORTH AMERICA ? ***

 

MAD SHEEP OF MAD RIVER VALLEY AND THE USDA ‘FALSE FLAG’ WAR ON THAT FAMILY, AND WHY TODAY A DECLARATION OF EXTRAORDINARY EMERGENCY DUE TO A FOREIGN ANIMAL DISEASE TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHY TSE PRION CHRONIC WASTING DISEASE CWD IN THE UNITED STATES AND NORTH AMERICA MUST BE CALLED FOR !!!

 


 

Friday, February 20, 2015

 

***APHIS Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Appeal Mouse Bio-Assays 2007-00030-A Sheep Imported From Belgium and the Presence of TSE Prion Disease Kevin Shea to Singeltary 2015

 


 

Friday, March 18, 2016 CFSAN

 

Constituent Update: FDA Announces Final Rule on Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy BSE MAD COW TSE PRION Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition - Constituent Update

 


 

Tuesday, March 15, 2016

 

*** Docket No. FDA-2016-N-0321 Risk Assessment of Foodborne Illness Associated with Pathogens from Produce Grown in Fields Amended with Untreated Biological Soil Amendments of Animal Origin; Request for Comments, Scientific Data, and Information Singeltary Submission ***

 


 

Monday, March 28, 2016

 

National Scrapie Eradication Program February 2016 Monthly Report

 


 

*** Docket No. APHIS-2007-0127 Scrapie in Sheep and Goats Terry Singeltary Sr. Submission ***

 

Monday, November 16, 2015

 

*** Docket No. APHIS-2007-0127 Scrapie in Sheep and Goats Terry Singeltary Sr. Submission ***

 


 


 

Saturday, July 18, 2015

 

SPONTANEOUS TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHY TSE PRION AKA MAD COW TYPE DISEASE, DOES IT EXIST NATURALLY IN THE FIELD?

 

SPONTANEOUS TRANSMISSIBLE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHY TSE PRION AKA MAD COW TYPE DISEASE, DOES IT EXIST NATURALLY IN THE FIELD?

 

*** We describe the transmission of spongiform encephalopathy in a non-human primate inoculated 10 years earlier with a strain of sheep c-scrapie. Because of this extended incubation period in a facility in which other prion diseases are under study, we are obliged to consider two alternative possibilities that might explain its occurrence.

 

We first considered the possibility of a sporadic origin (like CJD in humans). Such an event is extremely improbable because the inoculated animal was 14 years old when the clinical signs appeared, i.e. about 40% through the expected natural lifetime of this species, compared to a peak age incidence of 60–65 years in human sporadic CJD, or about 80% through their expected lifetimes.

 

***Moreover, sporadic disease has never been observed in breeding colonies or primate research laboratories, most notably among hundreds of animals over several decades of study at the National Institutes of Health25, and in nearly twenty older animals continuously housed in our own facility.***

 

Epidemiology | Neurological manifestations | Prion diseases Received: 16 February 2015 Accepted: 28 May 2015 Published online: 30 June 2015

 

Transmission of scrapie prions to primate after an extended silent incubation period

 


 

 SPONTANEOUS ATYPICAL BSE (LOL!)

 

 Thursday, March 24, 2016

 

FRANCE CONFIRMS BOVINE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHY BSE MAD COW (ESB) chez une vache dans les Ardennes

 


 

Sunday, October 5, 2014

 

France stops BSE testing for Mad Cow Disease

 


 

***atypical spontaneous BSE in France LOL***

 

FRANCE STOPS TESTING FOR MAD COW DISEASE BSE, and here’s why, to many spontaneous events of mad cow disease $$$

 

If you Compare France to other Countries with atypical BSE, in my opinion, you cannot explain this with ‘spontaneous’.

 

Table 1: Number of Atypical BSE cases reported by EU Member States in the period 2001–2014 by country and by type (L- and H-BSE) (extracted from EU BSE databases on 1 July 2014). By 2015, these data might be more comprehensive following a request from the European Commission to Member States for re-testing and retrospective classification of all positive bovine isolates in the EU in the years 2003–2009

 

BSE type

 

Country 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013(a) 2014(a) Total

 

H-BSE Austria 1 1

 

France(b) 1 2 3 1 2 2 2 2 15

 

Germany 1 1 2

 

Ireland 1 1 2 1 5

 

The Netherlands 1 1

 

Poland 1 1 2

 

Portugal 1 1

 

Spain 1 1 2

 

Sweden 1 1

 

United Kingdom 1 1 1 1 1 5

 

Total 2 3 3 1 1 2 2 2 4 4 5 1 4 1 35

 

L-BSE Austria 1 1 2

 

Denmark 1 1

 

France(b) 1 1 1 1 2 1 3 2 1 1 14

 

Germany 1 1 2

 

Italy 1 1 1 1 1 5

 

The Netherlands 1 1 1 3

 

Poland 1 2 2 1 2 1 2 1 12

 

Spain 2 2

 

United Kingdom 1 1 1 1 4

 

Total 0 5 3 4 3 3 6 3 3 4 3 6 1 1 45

 

Total Atypical cases (H + L)

 

2 8 6 5 4 5 8 5 7 8 8 7 5 2 80

 

(a): Data for 2013-2014 are incomplete and may not include all cases/countries reported.

 

(b): France has performed extensive retrospective testing to classify BSE cases, which is probably the explanation for the higher number of Atypical BSE cases reported in this country.

 

The number of Atypical BSE cases detected in countries that have already identified them seems to be similar from year to year. In France, a retrospective study of all TSE-positive cattle identified through the compulsory EU surveillance between 2001 and 2007 indicated that the prevalence of H-BSE and L-BSE was 0.35 and 0.41 cases per million adult cattle tested, respectively, which increased to 1.9 and 1.7 cases per million, respectively, in tested animals over eight years old (Biacabe et al., 2008). No comprehensive study on the prevalence of Atypical BSE cases has yet been carried out in other EU Member States. All cases of Atypical BSE reported in the EU BSE databases have been identified by active surveillance testing (59 % in fallen stock, 38 % in healthy slaughtered cattle and 4 % in emergency slaughtered cattle). Cases were reported in animals over eight years of age, with the exception of two cases (one H-BSE and one L-BSE) detected in Spain in 2011/2012. One additional case of H-BSE was detected in Switzerland in 2012 in a cow born in Germany in 2005 (Guldimann et al., 2012).

 


 


 

Wednesday, July 15, 2015

 

Additional BSE TSE prion testing detects pathologic lesion in unusual brain location and PrPsc by PMCA only, how many cases have we missed?

 


 

*** URGENT UPDATE ON FEED IN THE USA WITH HIGH RISK CWD TSE PRION DEER ***

 

Sunday, March 20, 2016

 

Docket No. FDA-2003-D-0432 (formerly 03D-0186) Use of Material from Deer and Elk in Animal Feed ***UPDATED MARCH 2016*** Singeltary Submission

 


 

Friday, February 05, 2016

 

*** Report of the Committee on Wildlife Diseases FY2015 CWD TSE PRION Detections in Farmed Cervids and Wild

 


 

Saturday, February 6, 2016

 

*** Secretary's Advisory Committee on Animal Health; Meeting [Docket No. APHIS-2016-0007] Singeltary Submission

 


 

Thursday, January 14, 2016

 

EMERGING ANIMAL DISEASES Actions Needed to Better Position USDA to Address Future Risks Report to the Chairman, Committee on Energy and Commerce, House of Representatives December 2015 GAO-16-132

 

GAO

 


 

Saturday, January 9, 2016

 

Transmission of sheep-bovine spongiform encephalopathy to pigs

 

Research article

 


 

Long live the OIE, or time to close the doors on a failed entity?

 

Long live the OIE

 

By Dr. Bernard Vallat, OIE Director General December 29, 2015 | 10:08 am EST

 


 

Wednesday, April 25, 2012

 

4th MAD COW DISEASE U.S.A. CALIFORNIA ATYPICAL L-TYPE BSE 2012

 


 

Saturday, January 29, 2011

 

Atypical L-Type Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (L-BSE) Transmission to Cynomolgus Macaques, a Non-Human Primate

 


 


 

Monday, September 13, 2010

 

atypical BSE strains and sporadic CJD strains, is there a connection and why shouldn't there be $

 


 

Sunday, April 12, 2009

 

TRANSMISSION OF ATYPICAL BOVINE SPONGIFORM ENCEPHALOPATHY (BSE) IN HUMANIZED MOUSE MODELS

 


 

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

 

MAD COW DISEASE terminology UK c-BSE (typical), atypical BSE H or L, and or Italian L-BASE

 


 

Thursday, January 3, 2008

 

ANIMAL HEALTH REPORT 2006 (BSE h-BASE EVENT IN ALABAMA, Scrapie, and CWD)

 


 

Thursday, April 14, 2016

 

Arizona 22 year old diagnosed with Creutzfeldt Jakob Disease CJD

 


 

Saturday, January 16, 2016

 

Revised Preventive Measures to Reduce the Possible Risk of Transmission of Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease and Variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease by Blood and Blood Products Guidance for Industry

 


 

Thursday, September 10, 2015

 

25th Meeting of the Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathies Advisory Committee Food and Drug Administration Silver Spring, Maryland June 1, 2015

 


 

 

Terry S. Singeltary Sr.

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