Transmission of avian viruses both bird-to-bird and from birds to non-avian species is a major health concern. Newcastle disease virus (NDV) is an economically important avian virus that poses substantial risks to the poultry industry. Rapid and sensitive diagnostic methods, such as the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), are required to track such infections. To develop an ELISA for detecting anti-NDV antibody in avian sera, the nucleocapsid protein (NCP) gene of the NDV La Sota strain was cloned and expressed in Escherichia coli and the 513-amino acid recombinant NCP was purified by Ni-NTA affinity chromatography. To evaluate its ability to replace NDV whole virus antigen as a coating antigen, NCP-coated and whole NDV-coated ELISAs were tested and compared using a panel of NDV positive antisera from chickens. Results using purified NCP were highly correlated with those obtained using whole NDV (r=0.927), demonstrating that recombinant NCP expressed in Escherichia coli is a suitable substitute antigen for whole NDV in a diagnostic ELISA.

Cutaneous leiomyomas (leiomyosarcomas) are smooth muscle tumors that occur single or as multiple lesions. They usually arise from the arrector pili muscles (piloleiomyomas) and less commonly from the muscle of veins (angioleiomyomas). This report describes histologic and immunohistochemical features of one cutaneous piloleiomyoma and two angioleiomyosarcomas. Three 7-12-year-old female dogs were presented with single or double cutaneous nodules. Histologically, the neoplastic masses were composed of densely or loosely arranged interlacing bundles. The neoplastic cells were ovoid to elongate, and had eosinophilic cytoplasms and perinuclear cytoplasmic vacuolation. Nuclei were central to eccentric, cigar shaped, oval to elongate. In two cases high mitotic index in high power field, multifocal necrosis and local invasion were also noted. Masson's trichrome and van Gieson staining revealed muscle origin tumors in these cases. Immunohistochemically, the tumor cells were strongly positive for smooth muscle actin. In our best knowledge, this is the first report of cutaneous smooth muscle tumors in dogs in Korea.

A 6-year-old, spayed female Miniature Pinscher dog with chronic vomiting lasted for 7 weeks was referred to the Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital of Chungnam National University. Physical examination, complete blood counts, serum chemistry, gastroscopy, upper gastrointestinal series, endoscopic biopsy and histopathological examination were performed for the diagnosis. The complete blood counts and serum biochemistry revealed no remarkable effect to the patient's general condition. Gastroscopy revealed erosion, erythema in mucosal surface of gastric lesions and endoscopic biopsy performed. No significant findings in upper gastrointestinal series were observed, and histopathologic examination revealed infiltration of lymphocyte in the gastric mucosa. Based on these findings, the dog was diagnosed with lymphocytic gastritis. The dog were treated by metronidazole and ranitidine with hypoallergenic diet, and then the patient showed no vomiting or other complications.

Atrophic rhinitis (AR) is the one of important respiratory diseases and causes severe economic losses in pig industry. Severe attempts have been made to reduce the economic losses by preventing the disease. One of the methods is the spraying of antibiotics into nasal cavity of piglets. Recently, the efficacy of the spraying with kanamycin and gentamicin was reduced in the Korean swine industry. Therefore, the preventive methods have been required to be changed based on the antimicrobial susceptibility profiles of causative agents of swine AR. Based on the current situations of this disease, Bordetella (B.) bronchiseptica and Pasteurella (P.) multocida 4D were isolated from pigs with clinical signs of AR. The isolation rates of B. bronchiseptica and P. multocida 4D were 58.5% and 32.9%, respectively. In the antimicrobial susceptibility test, the bacteria were resistant to kanamycin and gentamicin which have been used as the spraying agents, but they were susceptible to amikacin. A new spraying agent was developed using amikacin using β-glucan and yakbaltag as supplementary agents. Field efficacy of the agent was carried out with different schedule. The results from this study suggested that the newly developed spraying agents might be helpful to prevent AR in swine.

Paratuberculosis caused by Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (Mpt) is a chronic infectious enteric disease with deleterious impact on the performance in ruminants. In Korea, ELISA has been introduced to detect antibodies to Mpt in individual cattle. However, comparison study with ELISA has not been studied until now. In total, a panel of 899 serum samples obtained from dairy cattle was analyzed with two commercial ELISAs for Mpt to assess the performance. Two ELISAs employed in this study were both licensed worldwide. Two ELISAs applied onto same serum samples showed the morderate agreement (kappa value = 0.06). There was non-significant McNemar test (p=0.0614) between two ELISA results indicating that each proportion detected by two kits did not differ. In addition, the percent agreement between two ELISA results was turned out to be 96.8% which interpreted excellent reproducibility. It was shown from this study that two ELISAs revealed moderate kappa agreement performance. The implication raised is that when ELISAs as diagnostics are used to detect Mpt in individual cattle, positive reaction by either ELISA should be interpreted as serologically Mpt positive due to presumed low sensitivity of ELISAs and their test agreement being less than 100%.

A 11-year-old female mixed cat with subcutaneous mass around the left 5th mammary glands was presented to local animal hospital. According to history taking, the mass recurred 2 times on the same site of abdomen. After surgical excision, subcutaneous mass was referred to Pathology Department of Veterinary Medicine in the Jeju National University. Grossly, round to oval, milky yellow or pale red nodules, measuring 0.1~1 cm in diameter, were occupied in the subcutis. Microscopically, the most neoplastic sweat glands were proliferated in the dermis and subcutis. Most tubules were lined by round to oval shaped epithelium with eosinophilic cytoplasm, hyperchromatic nuclei with high mitotic figures and severe central necrosis. The neoplastic epithelium also had periodic acid-Schiff-positive diastase-resistant cytoplasmic granules, but was negative for Perl's iron stain. Based on the gross, histopathologic and special staining, this cat was diagnosed as apocrine sweat gland adenocarcinoma. In our best knowledge, this is the first report of apocrine sweat gland adenocarcinoma around abdominal mammary gland in a cat.

This study examined the efficacy of apitoxin for the treatment of otitis externa in dogs. Ten dogs with otitis externa were allocated randomly to two groups. The control group was treated with the susceptible antibiotics and the experimental group was injected with apitoxin into the tragus subcutaneously. There were no significant differences in the clinical scores, blood WBC counts and neutrophil/lymphocyte ratios between the control and experimental groups. By 2 weeks, the bacterial cell counts were significantly lower in the experimental group than the control (p less than 0.05). No adverse reactions were observed in any of the dogs during the study. This suggests that a topical injection of apitoxin is an effective treatment for otitis externa in dogs.

The prevalence of potentially xenozoonotic viruses in the reproductive tract of female pigs in Korea was investigated by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). These viruses include porcine endogenous retrovirus (PERV), porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV), swine hepatitis E virus (SHEV), porcine lymphotropic herpesvirus (PLHV), and porcine circovirus type 2 (PCV-2). Histopathological examination and PCR analysis were conducted using the ovaries of 70 slaughtered pigs that were collected from 14 farms in Jeju. Histopathologically, infiltrations of mononuclear inflammatory cells around the thick-walled coiled vessels in the ovarian medulla were observed in 15 cases. Based on the PCR method, PERV, PLHV, PRRSV, SHEV, and PCV-2 were detected in 69 (98.6%), 35 (50%), 5 (7.1%), 4 (5.7%), and 1 sample (1.4%), respectively. These results suggest that PERV and PLHV are the major xenozoonotic viruses in the porcine ovary. This study should aid in the development of a monitoring protocal for potencial xenozoonotic agents and in the production of germ-free pigs for xenotransplantation.

Bovine mastitis is an important disease causing serious economic loss in dairy production and food poison in public health. Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus are the major causative agents of bovine mastitis. These bacteria were found in milk and environmental condition such as feces, water, soil and so on. Bovine mastitis causative micro-organisms can survive in 1-2 weeks in feces and bed complexes. Low level of percentage of water content (PWC) of feces and bed complexes can reduce the spreading of bovine mastitis incidence from environmental contamination. In this study, we developed the fecal dehydrating system and determined the elimination rates of bovine mastitis causative agent from feces and bed complexes. To develop the fecal dehydrating system, the screw pressurized dehydrating system was used and the maximum rate of dehydrating was reached to 52% PWC using 90% PWC (wet base) of fecal and bed complexes. The elimination rates of the dehydrating system for E. coli and S. aureus were reached at 41.19±7.84% to 62.55±8.71% in various percentages of PWC of feces and bed complexes (80, 85 and 90%). These results suggested that the application of fecal dehydrating system would reduce can exposure of dairy cattle to bovine mastitis causing agents contaminated feces and bed complexes, and can be used for environmental bovine mastitis control avoiding misuse or abuse of chemical disinfectants and antibiotics in dairy farm.

Neurofascin, one of the members of L1CAM, has been known to have some important roles during the development of nerve fibers. In order to investigate the role of neurofascin associated with the formation of Schmidt-Lantermann incisure in the sciatic nerve, the localization of neurofascin was studied with electron microscopy, immuno-fluorescence and immuno-electron microscopy. In the electron microscopy, the first formation of Schmidt-Lantermann incisure was checked at postnatal day 6 and the complete form of incisures traversing the whole myelin sheath began to be observed at postnatal day 8. In the immunofluorescence, neurofascin immunoreactive Schmidt-Lantermann incisures were first checked at postnatal day 6 and dramatically increased with aging by postnatal day 56. In the immunoelectron microscopy, neurofascin immunoreactive gold particles at the incisure forming sites were first observed at postnatal day 6 and the number of gold particles was increased as the animal was getting old by postnatal day 56. According to the present study, neurofascin is likely to have some relationships with Schmidt-Lantermann incisure formation.