Following the introduction of West Nile virus (WNV) into North America in 1999, surveillance for WNV in migratory and resident birds was established in Tamaulipas State, northern México in December 2001. Overall, 796 birds representing 70 species and 10 orders were captured and assayed for antibodies to WNV. Nine birds had flavivirus-specific antibodies by epitope-blocking enzyme-linked immunos...

One of the hypotheses invoked to explain the occurrence of different diseases associated with dengue virus infection is that dengue viruses differ in virulence properties. Observations on virologically studied dengue fever and dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF)"'8 patients have reasonably established that both of these diseases are associated with dengue viruses of all known antigenic types. The po...

West Nile virus (WNV) is a small, enveloped, spherical virus that belongs to the family Flaviviridae, genus Flavivirus, Japanese encephalitis serocomplex. Natural reservoirs of WNV are birds, and the main vectors are mosquitoes of the genus Culex. There are seven genetic lineages of WNV. Lineages 1 and 2 are the most widely distributed (Africa, North and South America, Europe, Asia and Australi...

BACKGROUND During clinical development of the licensed Japanese encephalitis chimeric virus vaccine (JE-CV), the neutralization capacity of vaccine-induced antibodies was assessed against the vaccine virus and against well characterized wild-type (wt) viruses isolated between 1949-1991. We assessed whether JE-CV-induced antibodies can also neutralize more recent wt Japanese encephalitis virus (...

The Pantanal is a hotspot for arbovirus studies in South America. Various medically important flaviviruses and alphaviruses have been reported in domestic and wild animals in the region. To expand the knowledge of local arbovirus circulation, a serosurvey for 14 Brazilian orthobunyaviruses was conducted with equines, sheep and free-ranging caimans. Sera were tested for specific viral antibodies...

For the production of dengue-vaccine candidates, empty capsids, or virus-like particles (VLPs), of parvovirus B19 that carry dengue 2-specific epitopes were employed as antigen carriers. Two epitopes (comprising amino acids 352-368 and 386-397) of domain BIII of the envelope glycoprotein were chosen to produce recombinant B19 VLPs for immunization of BALB/c mice. Serum samples from immunized mi...

UNLABELLED Meningitis and encephalitis are complications of West Nile virus (WNV) infection. Although WNV is endemic in North America, the virus has recently been reported in Colombia and Argentina. Investigation of WNV in Brazil is important since this virus has never been studied previously in this country. OBJECTIVE To investigate the presence of WNV infection in viral encephalitis/meningi...

background: bacteria in dental plaque are one of the main factors causing periodontal disease. the aim was to evaluate and compare the effectiveness of antimicrobial dentifrices with herbal extracts and conventional toothpaste with no antimicrobial action for improvement of oral hygiene  and reduction of gingival inflammation. methods: 48 volunteers with chronic marginal gingivitis were randoml...