First detection of Leptospira santarosai in the reproductive track of a boar: A potential threat to swine production and public health.

Background: Leptospirosis causes significant economic losses and is an occupational risk in the swine industry, especially in developing tropical regions where social and geoclimatic conditions are favorable for the transmission of this disease. Although vaccination can reduce infection risk, efficacy is diminished if local genetic and antigenic variants of the pathogen are not accounted for in the vaccine. Identifying and characterizing strains hosts, and potential mechanisms of transmission is therefore critical for public health mitigation practices.

Interactions of leptospira with environmental bacteria from surface water.

Leptospires can persist for months in nutrient-poor aqueous environments prior to transmission to a mammalian host. Interactions with environmental bacteria and biofilm formation are possible mechanisms of persistence of leptospires in the environment. Bacteria isolated from rivers in the Ecuadorian rainforest were tested for their ability to support leptospiral viability.

Mircobial community composition in petroleum-contaminated and uncontaminated soil from Francisco de Orellana, in the northern Ecuadorian Amazon.

The microbial compositions of two soils from the northern Ecuadorian Amazon (Francisco de Orellana province), one contaminated with petroleum and the other uncontaminated, were compared. Classical culture and molecular techniques were used to analyze microbial diversity. The cultivable Bacteria from contaminated soil belonged to betaproteobacteria (16.

Lamina-associated polypeptide 2 (LAP2) expression in fish and amphibians.

Somatic and germinal cells of 15 fish and 33 amphibian species were examined by SDS-PAGE followed by immunoblotting to determine the expression of LAP2 (lamina-associated polypeptide 2). LAP2 expression in frogs, salamanders and fish does not vary with the mode of reproduction. In fish and frog cells, a rim-like LAP2 positive region was detected around the nucleus by indirect immunofluorescence microscopy.