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Background: Neonatal diarrhea remains one of the main causes of morbi-mortality in dairy calves under artificial rearing. It is often caused by infectious agents of viral, bacterial, or parasitic origin. Cows vaccination and colostrum intake by calves during the first 6 h of life are critical strategies to prevent severe diarrhea but these are still insufficient. Here we report the field evaluation of a product based on IgY antibodies against group A rotavirus (RVA), coronavirus (CoV), enterotoxigenic Escherichia coli, and Salmonella sp. This product, named IgY DNT, has been designed as a complementary passive immunization strategy to prevent neonatal calf diarrhea. The quality of the product depends on the titers of specific IgY antibodies to each antigen evaluated by ELISA. In the case of the viral antigens, ELISA antibody (Ab) titers are correlated with protection against infection in calves experimentally challenged with RVA and CoV (Bok M, et al., Passive immunity to control bovine coronavirus diarrhea in a dairy herd

Bovine viral diarrhoea virus (BVDV) is a major cause of economic loss in the cattle industry, worldwide. Infection results in reduced productive performance, growth retardation, reduced milk production and increased susceptibility to other diseases leading to early culling of animals. There are two primary methods used to control the spread of BVDV: the elimination of persistently infected (PI) animals and vaccination. Currently, modified live or inactivated vaccines are used in BVDV vaccination programmes, but there are safety risks or insufficient protection, respectively, with these vaccines. Here, we report the development and efficacy of the first targeted subunit vaccine against BVDV. The core of the vaccine is the fusion of the BVDV structural protein, E2, to a single-chain antibody, APCH, together termed, APCH-E2.The APCH antibody targets the E2 antigen to the major histocompatibility type II molecule (MHC-II) present on antigen-presenting cells. Industrial production of the vaccine is carried out using the baculovirus expression vector system (BEVS) using single-use manufacturing technologies. This new subunit vaccine induces strong BVDV-specific neutralizing antibodies in guinea pigs and cattle. Importantly, in cattle with low levels of natural BVDV-specific neutralizing antibodies, the vaccine induced strong neutralizing antibody levels to above the protective threshold, as determined by a competition ELISA. The APCH-E2 vaccine induced a rapid and sustained neutralizing antibody response compared with a conventional vaccine in cattle.

Abstract. We present the results of a series of physical models aiming to reproduce rapid subsidence (at least 25 m in 30 years) observed in the sediments of a maar crater caused by extraction of groundwater in the interconnected adjacent aquifer. The model considered plausible variations in the geometry of the crater basement and the measured rate of groundwater extraction (1 m per year in the time interval from 2005 to 2011) in 15 wells located around the structure. The experiments were built within a rigid plastic bowl in which the sediments and rocks of the maar sequence were modeled using different materials: (a) plasticine for the rigid country rock, (b) gravel for the fractured country rock forming the diatreme fill and, (c) water saturated hollow glass microbeads for the lacustrine sedimentary fill of the crater. Water table was maintained initially at the surface of the sediments and then was allowed to flow through a hole made at the base of the rigid bowl. Water extraction provoked a sequence of gentle deformation, fracturing, and faulting of the surface in all the experiments. Vertical as well as lateral displacements were observed in the surface of the experiments. We discuss the results of 2 representative models. The model results reproduced the main geometry of the ring faults affecting the crater sediments and helps to explain the diversity of structures observed in relation with the diatreme geometry. The surface of the models was monitored continuously with an optical interferometric technique called structured light projection. Images collected at nearly constant time intervals were analyzed using the ZEBRA software and the obtained interferometric pairs permitted to analyze the full field subsidence in the model (submilimetric vertical displacements). The experiments were conducted at a continuous flow rate extraction and show a also a linear subsidence rate. Comparison among the results of the physical models and the fault system associated to subsidence in the maar show that fault geometry in the sedimentary sequence imitates closely the geometry of the volcanic basement.