Experimental Transmission of Vesicular Stomatitis New Jersey Virus From <I>Simulium vittatum</I> to Cattle: Clinical Outcome Is Influenced by Site of Insect Feeding

Abstract

Vesicular stomatitis New Jersey virus (VSNJV) is an insect-transmitted Rhabdovirus causing vesicular disease in domestic livestock including cattle, horses, and pigs. Natural transmission during epidemics remains poorly understood, particularly in cattle, one of the most affected species during outbreaks. This study reports the first successful transmission of VSNJV to cattle by insect bite resulting in clinical disease. When infected black flies (Simulium vittatum Zetterstedt) fed at sites where VS lesions are usually observed (mouth, nostrils, and foot coronary band), infection occurred, characterized by local viral replication, vesicular lesions, and high neutralizing antibody titers (> 1: 256). Viral RNA was detected up to 9 d postinfection in tissues collected during necropsy from lesion sites and lymph nodes draining those sites. Interestingly, when flies were allowed to feed on flank or neck skin, viral replication was poor, lesions were not observed, and low levels of neutralizing antibodies (range, 1:8-1:32) developed. Viremia was never observed in any of the animals and infectious virus was not recovered from tissues on necropsies performed between 8 and 27 d postinfection. Demonstration that VSNJV transmission to cattle by infected black flies can result in clinical disease contributes to a better understanding of the epidemiology and potential prevention and control methods for this important disease.

Mechanical Transmission of Vesicular Stomatitis New Jersey Virus by <I>Simulium vittatum</I> (Diptera: Simuliidae) to Domestic Swine (<I>Sus scrofa</I>)

“…Biological transmission of VSNJV by black ßies to mice (Mead et al 1999(Mead et al , 2000, domestic swine (Mead et al 2004a), and domestic cattle (Mead et al 2009) has been demonstrated. In addition, colonized biting midges, Culicoides sonorensis Wirth & Jones, are susceptible to VSNJV infection (Nunamaker et al 2000, Drolet et al 2005, and experimentally infected midges have been shown to transmit the virus to guinea pigs ) and cattle .…”

Use of cell morphology as an early bio-sensor for viral infection

“…To the authors' best knowledge, no literature has reported whether the infection of VSV is uniform in individual cells. Furthermore, the entrance of virus would interfere with cell life cycle progression [22,23,24]. But it is not clear whether the cell life cycle stage itself, upon viral infection, would on the other hand have a selective effect on the ability of adopting viral infection.…”

Domestic cattle as a non-conventional amplifying host of vesicular stomatitis New Jersey virus

“…In livestock, viraemia was not detected in VSNJV-infected swine (Patterson et al, 1955;Redelman et al, 1989;Comer et al, 1995;Stallknecht et al, 1999Stallknecht et al, , 2001Stallknecht et al, , 2004Mead et al, 2004aMead et al, , 2004b, cattle (Cotton, 1926;Scherer et al, 2007;Mead et al, 2009) or horses (Green, 1993;Howerth et al, 2006). In studies involving wildlife, experimental VSNJV infection of white-tailed deer (Karstad & Hanson, 1957;Comer et al, 1995) and pronghorn antelope (Thorne et al, 1983) did not result in viraemia, which suggests that these wild animals, which are naturally susceptible to VSNJV, are not amplifying hosts.…”