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Background: Tick-borne encephalitis (TBE) is the most common viral CNS infection with incidences much higher than all other virus infections together in many risk areas of central and eastern Europe. The Odenwald Hill region (OWH) in southwestern Germany is classified as a TBE risk region and frequent case numbers but also more severe infections have been reported within the past decade. The objective of the present study was to survey the prevalence of tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV) in Ixodes ricinus and to associate TBEV genetic findings with TBE infections in the OWH. Methods: Ticks were collected by the flagging methods supported by a crowdsourcing project implementing the interested public as collectors to cover completely and collect randomly a 3532 km 2 area of the OWH TBE risk region. Prevalence of TBEV in I. ricinus was analysed by reversed transcription quantitative real-time PCR. Phylogeographic analysis was performed to classify OWH TBEV isolates within a European network of known TBEV strains. Mutational sequence analysis including 3D modelling of envelope protein pE was performed and based on a clinical database, a spatial association of TBE case frequency and severity was undertaken. Results: Using the crowd sourcing approach we could analyse a total of 17,893 ticks. The prevalence of TBEV in I. ricinus in the OWH varied, depending on analysed districts from 0.12% to 0% (mean 0.04%). Calculated minimum infection rate (MIR) was one decimal power higher. All TBEV isolates belonged to the European subtype. Sequence analysis revealed a discontinuous segregation pattern of OWH isolates with two putative different lineages and a spatial association of two isolates with increased TBE case numbers as well as exceptional severe to fatal infection courses.

Summary:A radioimniunoassay (RIA) for the measurement of thyroglobulin in human serum was developed and factors that influence sensitivity were investigated. In a comparison of 3 different labeling procedures (chloramine T, iodogen, lactoperoxidase) iodogen-prepared tracer proved to be slightly superior with respect to sensitivity and stability. The shelf life of the tracer was improved by a protein-enriched buffer, which serves äs a radical scavenger. The binding kinetics of tracer to antibody at different temperature ranges were examined, and the most rapid and complete binding was found at room temperature. For the preparation of Standard curves, several artificial media were compared with thyroglobulin-free serum. Second antibody Separation was investigated and optimized. By employing sequential Saturation, sensitivity of 0.75 g/l (Bö-3 SD) and 50% intercept of less than 5 g/l were achieved. The results of RIA measurements of thyroglobulin in 142 patients with papillary and follicular thyroid carcinoma after thyroidectomy and 131 I treatment were compared with 131 I whole-body scans. The results confirmed that serum thyroglobulin is an early indicator of recurrency. Radioimmunoassay für Thyreoglobulin im Serum zur Früherkennung von Rezidiven und Metastasen in der

The existence of soluble forms of HLA class I and class II antigens in human serum is well established and altered concentrations of these serum proteins have been described to be associated with various diseases. Since soluble HLA antigens (sHLA) can be measured both in serum and plasma samples, we investigated whether anticoagulant treatment influences the determined levels of soluble HLA class I (sHLA-I) or soluble HLA-DR (sHLA-DR). Analyzing paired samples of serum and plasma of 40 healthy individuals we found significantly lower serum levels of sHLA-DR (0.31 +/- 0.15 ng/ml) compared to EDTA plasma levels (0.58 +/- 0.20 ng/ml). By contrast, serum levels of sHLA-I (0.89 +/- 0.74 micrograms/ml) were only slightly lower than EDTA plasma values (0.95 +/- 0.86 micrograms/ml), a situation similar to that of sIL-2R and sCD4 levels. Further experiments intended to clarify the reasons of the reduced sHLA-DR serum levels revealed that (i) the blood storage time before centrifugation did not influence the sHLA-DR level, (ii) treatment of serum with anticoagulant did not augment the measured sHLA-DR concentration, and (iii) the recovery of spiked sHLA-DR was significantly lower when added to native blood than to serum or anticoagulant-treated blood. These results suggest that sHLA-DR is partly removed by the process of blood clotting thus resulting in diminished sHLA-DR serum levels.

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