Bluetongue virus (BTV) causes bluetongue disease, a vector-borne disease of ruminants. The recent northerly spread of BTV serotype 8 in Europe resulted in outbreaks characterized by clinical signs in cattle, including unusual teratogenic effects. Vaccination has been shown to be crucial for controlling the spread of vector-borne diseases such as BTV. With the aim of developing a novel subunit v...

BACKGROUND Bluetongue is a disease of domestic and wild ruminants caused by bluetongue virus serotypes (BTV), which have caused serious outbreaks worldwide. Commercially available vaccines are live-attenuated or inactivated virus strains: these are effective, but there is the risk of reversion to virulence or reassortment with circulating strains for live virus, and residual live virus for the ...

This paper describes the expression of a cloned African horsesickness virus (AHSV) serotype 5 VP2-gene by a baculovirus recombinant that was generated by the BAC-TO-BAC system. Immunization of horses with crude cell lysates containing recombinant baculovirus-expressed AHSV5 VP2 did induce neutralizing antibodies, but afforded only partial protection against virulent virus challenge. Further ana...

Candotti and colleagues (1) reported the prevalence of a third strain of human erythrovirus, genotype 3 (V9), in the Ghanaian population and, in part, concluded that a genotype 1 (B19)-based assay failed to detect genotype 3 immunoglobulin G (IgG) in 38.5% of Ghanaian samples containing genotype 3 antibodies. We disagree with this conclusion for the following reasons. (i) No details are furnish...

Efficient encapsulation of foreign molecules like proteins and low molecular weight drugs into polyoma virus-like particles (capsoids) was achieved by the development of an anchoring technique based upon the specific interaction of the inner core protein VP2 with VP1 pentamers. A stretch of 49 amino acids of VP2 served as an anchor molecule, either expressed as a fusion protein with green fluor...

The structure of the icosahedral capsid of the H-1 parvovirus was probed by chemical cross-linking methods. Treatment of empty capsids with high-molecular-weight polyethylene glycols resulted in irreversible aggregation of the minor capsid protein VP1. Multimers of VP1 containing at least five and perhaps six molecules were obtained, but only with empty capsids and not with the full, DNA-contai...

Bluetongue virus (BTV) is a member of Orbivirus genus in family Reoviridae. The virus genome is composed of 10 double-stranded RNA segments. The RNA segment L2 encodes an outer capsid viral protein VP2, which is the main determinant of neutralization and serotype-specific immune response. BTV serotype 1 (BTV-1) specific novel primer pair was designed using VP2 gene sequences available in GenBan...

Earth's lowermost mantle has thermal, chemical, and mineralogical complexities that require precise seismological characterization. Stacking, migration, and modeling of over 10,000 P and S waves that traverse the deep mantle under the Cocos plate resolve structures above the core-mantle boundary. A small -0.07 +/- 0.15% decrease of P wave velocity (Vp) is accompanied by a 1.5 +/- 0.5% increase ...

UNLABELLED African horse sickness virus (AHSV) is a virus species in the genus Orbivirus of the family Reoviridae. There are nine serotypes of AHSV showing different levels of cross neutralization. AHSV is transmitted by species of Culicoides biting midges and causes African horse sickness (AHS) in equids, with a mortality rate of up to 95% in naive horses. AHS has become a serious threat for c...