The potential for transmissible spongiform encephalopathies in non-ruminant livestock and fish

Characterization of a 12 kDa Thermal‐Stable Antigenic Protein in Bovine Blood

“…A great deal of effort has, therefore, been devoted to developing effective methods for the detection of animal blood in both animal feed and food. These methods have focused on the detection of bovine blood because blood used for such purposes is primarily porcine and bovine in origin, and so far no natural cases of TSEs have been found in nonruminants such as horses and pigs (Matthews and Cooke 2003). Our group has previously reported a competitive enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (cELISA) for the quantitative detection of bovine blood in heat-processed meat and feed (Rao and Hsieh 2008).…”

Fishing for Prion Protein Function

“…If so, then this organism could represent a powerful system for drug screening. Incidentally, fish for human consumption are sometimes fed with meat and bone meal [36], so the possibility of a “natural” prion infection in fish cannot be excluded. In conclusion, it seems likely that prion researchers will be hearing much more in the future from animals with fins as well as those with feet.…”

Characterization of the porcine multicopy ribosomal protein SA/37-kDa laminin receptor gene family

“…Wilesmith et al, 1988). Contrary to that, an oral transmission of PrP Sc and an ensuing infection seems to be blocked in non-ruminants such as pigs and chicken (Matthews and Cooke, 2003), presumably by a species-specific barrier in the gut (Hill and Collinge, 2002). Although it has been shown that pigs are capable of developing a TSE crisis after multiple parenteral injections of PrP Sc contaminated brain homogenate, no transmission occurred after an oral exposure of PrP Sc , even in a 100 times higher concentration than the one determined necessary for oral infection in cattle (Wells et al, 2003).…”