Coxiella burnetii in Infertile Dairy Cattle With Chronic Endometritis

Abstract

Coxiella burnetii is an obligate intracellular pathogen and the cause of Q fever in many animal species and humans. Several studies have reported the association between C. burnetii and abortion, premature delivery, stillbirth, and weak offspring. However, no solid evidence indicates that C. burnetii causes endometritis, subfertility, and retained fetal membranes. For this study, histopathological and PCR evaluation were performed on 40 uterine biopsies from dairy cattle with poor fertility. Uterine swabs were concurrently tested with microbiology assays. The endometrial biopsies of 30 cows did not have any significant lesions, and no pathogens were identified by aerobic bacterial culture and PCR. Ten cows were PCR-positive for C. burnetii and negative for other pathogens by aerobic bacterial culture and PCR. These 10 cases revealed a mild to severe chronic endometritis admixed with perivascular and periglandular fibrosis. Immunohistochemical evaluation of C. burnetii PCR-positive biopsies identified, for the first time, the presence of intralesional and intracytoplasmic C. burnetii in macrophages in the endometrium of cattle.

Bovine abortion caused by Coxiella burnetii: report of a cluster of cases in Uruguay and review of the literature

“…32 Although there seems to be little doubt about the role of C. burnetii in bovine abortion, the role that this microorganism may have in other reproductive disorders of cattle, such as infertility, premature delivery, endometritis, metritis, and mastitis is controversial. 1,16 C. burnetii DNA has frequently been detected in cases of endocarditis in cattle at slaughter 3 ; however, the clinical significance of this finding remains undetermined. C. burnetii DNA and its antigen have also been detected in endometrial biopsies of cows with repeat breeding failure.…”

Autophagy and NLRP3 inflammasome crosstalk in neuroinflammation in aged bovine brains

“…For IHC, 4‐μm‐thick sections of hippocampus were mounted on positively charged glass slides (Bio‐Optica, Milan). For antibody detection, we used a well‐established protocol described elsewhere (De Biase et al, ). Briefly, antigen retrieval pretreatments were performed using a HIER citrate buffer pH 6.0 (Bio‐Optica, Milan, Italy) for 20 min at 98°C.…”

“…Double immunofluorescence was used to qualitatively investigate NLRP3‐Beclin1 and NLRP3‐SOD1 coexpression in bovine brains. The pretreatment steps were the same as those used for immunoperoxidase labeling and the procedure was described elsewhere (De Biase et al, ). Primary antibodies used in this study included rabbit polyclonal Beclin1 (BECN 1 H300: sc‐11,427; Santa Cruz Biotechnology, Dallas, TX), diluted 1:400 in PBS (0.01 M PBS, pH 7.2) and rabbit polyclonal superoxide dismutase 1 (SOD1, ab13498; AbCam, Cambridge, UK) diluted 1:400 in PBS.…”

“…For antibody detection, we used a well-established protocol described elsewhere (De Biase et al, 2018). Briefly, antigen retrieval pretreatments were performed using a HIER citrate buffer pH 6.0 In the corresponding negative control sections, the primary antibody was either omitted or replaced with normal serum from the same species of primary antibody (rabbit).…”

“…Double immunofluorescence was used to qualitatively investigate NLRP3-Beclin1 and NLRP3-SOD1 coexpression in bovine brains. The pretreatment steps were the same as those used for immunoperoxidase labeling and the procedure was described elsewhere (De Biase et al, 2018). Primary antibodies used in this study included rabbit DE BIASE ET AL.…”