Microscopic Review of Nasopharyngeal Swabs as a Means of Benchside Quality Assurance.

Objective: Nasopharyngeal swabs (NPS) are the collection modality of choice for reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) multiplex array for respiratory viruses. NPS gather both extracellular material and human respiratory epithelial cells and, when used with RT-PCR, have reliable sensitivity for detection of viral infection.

Goals: At our institution, we identified a 1.

Assessment of yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae component binding to Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis using bovine epithelial cells.

Background: Since yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae and its components are being used for the prevention and treatment of enteric diseases in different species, they may also be useful for preventing Johne's disease, a chronic inflammatory bowel disease of ruminants caused by Mycobacterium avium spp. paratuberculosis (MAP). This study aimed to identify potential yeast derivatives that may be used to help prevent MAP infection.

Effect of Penicillium mycotoxins on the cytokine gene expression, reactive oxygen species production, and phagocytosis of bovine macrophage (BoMacs) function.

Bovine macrophages (BoMacs) were exposed to the following Penicillium mycotoxins (PM): citrinin (CIT), ochratoxin A (OTA), patulin (PAT), mycophenolic acid (MPA) and penicillic acid (PA). PM exposure at the concentration that inhibits proliferation by 25% (IC25) differentially for 24h altered the gene expression of various cytokines. OTA significantly induced IL-1α expression (p<0.