A novel panel of peptides with diagnostic potential for serological identification of Borrelia burgdorferi sensu stricto, B. garinii and B. afzelii in human sera.

A novel panel of peptide for serological identification of Borrelia burgdoferi sensu stricto, Borrelia garinii and Borrelia afzelii was developed and assessed in this study. The diagnostic algorithm of the novel test was initially trained testing 10 US human sera including 3 early-stage and 3 late-stage Lyme disease positive sera, 2 sera positive for Babesia and 2 sera positive for Syphilis, all purchased from a private biorepository. Findings were then corroborated testing (a) 33 additional EU follow-up positive sera from seroconverted patients bitten by ticks that tested positive for B.

Cytokine expression in subjects with ssp. positive blood cultures and a meta-analysis of cytokine expression in Crohn's disease.

Objectives: 1) Culture ssp. (MAP)from blood, 2) assess infection persistence, 3) determine Crohn's disease (CD) cytokine expression, 4) compare CD cytokine expression to tuberculosis, and 5) perform a meta-analysis of cytokine expression in CD.

Methods: The Temple University/Abilene Christian University (TU/ACU) study had a prospective case control design with 201 subjects including 61 CD patients and 140 non-CD controls.

Production of recombinant proteins including the B-cell epitopes of autolysin A of Staphylococcus aureus isolated from clinical sheep mastitis and their potential for vaccine development.

Staphylococcus aureus is the most common clinical mastitis-associated pathogen in sheep which contributes to reduced welfare of affected animals and, therefore, compromises the quality and quantity of milk production. To prevent mastitis and its spread, it is essential to guarantee adequate breeding conditions and animal health, through the adoption of good farm management practices and the application of suitable biosecurity measures. Vaccination can play a strategic role in prevention, control, and eradication of diseases.

Comparison of a mycobacterial phage assay to detect viable Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis with standard diagnostic modalities in cattle with naturally infected Johne disease.

Background: Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (MAP), the cause of Johne disease, is a slow growing mycobacterium. Viable MAP detection is difficult, inconstant and time-consuming. The purpose of this study was to compare a rapid phage/qPCR assay performed on peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) with three standard methods of MAP detection: fecal MAP PCR; plasma antigen-specific IFN-γ & serum MAP ELISA hypothesizing that, if sensitive and specific, Johne animals would be positive and Control animals negative.

Presence of Infection by subsp. in the Blood of Patients with Crohn's Disease and Control Subjects Shown by Multiple Laboratory Culture and Antibody Methods.

subspecies (MAP) has long been suspected to be involved in the etiology of Crohn's disease (CD). An obligate intracellular pathogen, MAP persists and influences host macrophages. The primary goals of this study were to test new rapid culture methods for MAP in human subjects and to assess the degree of viable culturable MAP bacteremia in CD patients compared to controls.

A novel one-day phage-based test for rapid detection and enumeration of viable Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis in cows' milk.

Bacteriophage-based methods for the rapid detection of viable Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis (MAP) in veterinary specimens are a recent addition to the Johne's disease diagnostic toolbox. Here, we report the use of D29 mycobacteriophage-coated tosylactivated paramagnetic beads to capture and concentrate MAP cells from samples (termed phagomagnetic separation, PhMS) and then naturally lyse viable MAP cells (from the inside out) to provide DNA for IS900 qPCR purposes.

Methods for detection of viable foodborne pathogens: current state-of-art and future prospects.

The ability to rapidly detect viable pathogens in food is important for public health and food safety reasons. Culture-based detection methods, the traditional means of demonstrating microbial viability, tend to be laborious, time consuming and slow to provide results. Several culture-independent methods to detect viable pathogens have been reported in recent years, including both nucleic acid-based (PCR combined with use of cell viability dyes or reverse-transcriptase PCR to detect messenger RNA) and phage-based (plaque assay or phage amplification and lysis plus PCR/qPCR, immunoassay or enzymatic assay to detect host DNA, progeny phages or intracellular components) methods.

Viable Mycobacterium avium ssp. paratuberculosis isolated from calf milk replacer.

When advising farmers on how to control Johne's disease in an infected herd, one of the main recommendations is to avoid feeding waste milk to calves and instead feed calf milk replacer (CMR). This advice is based on the assumption that CMR is free of viable Mycobacterium avium ssp. paratuberculosis (MAP) cells, an assumption that has not previously been challenged.

Efficacy of Instant Hand Sanitizers against Foodborne Pathogens Compared with Hand Washing with Soap and Water in Food Preparation Settings: A Systematic Review.

Hands can be a vector for transmitting pathogenic microorganisms to foodstuffs and drinks, and to the mouths of susceptible hosts. Hand washing is the primary barrier to prevent transmission of enteric pathogens via cross-contamination from infected persons. Conventional hand washing involves the use of water, soap, and friction to remove dirt and microorganisms.

Application of a peptide-mediated magnetic separation-phage assay for detection of viable Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis to bovine bulk tank milk and feces samples.

Naturally contaminated bovine bulk tank milk (n = 44) and feces (n = 39) were tested for the presence of viable Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis by a novel peptide-mediated magnetic separation-phage (PMS-phage) assay. Counts of viable M.

Maximizing capture efficiency and specificity of magnetic separation for Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis cells.

In order to introduce specificity for Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis prior to a phage amplification assay, various magnetic-separation approaches, involving either antibodies or peptides, were evaluated in terms of the efficiency of capture (expressed as a percentage) of M. avium subsp.

Rapid assessment of the viability of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis cells after heat treatment, using an optimized phage amplification assay.

Thermal inactivation experiments were carried out to assess the utility of a recently optimized phage amplification assay to accurately enumerate viable Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis cells in milk. Ultra-heat-treated (UHT) whole milk was spiked with large numbers of M.

Optimization of a phage amplification assay to permit accurate enumeration of viable Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis cells.

A commercially available phage amplification assay, FASTPlaqueTB (Biotec Laboratories, Ipswich, United Kingdom), when used according to the manufacturer's instructions, does not permit accurate enumeration of Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis. The aim of this study was to optimize the phage amplification assay conditions to permit accurate quantification of viable M.