BACKGROUND Incidence of food-borne infections from Listeria monocytogenes, a parasite that has adapted intracellular residence to avoid antibody onslaught, has increased dramatically in the past few years. The apparent lack of an effective vaccine that is capable of evoking the desired cytotoxic T cell response to obliterate this intracellular pathogen has encouraged the investigation of altern...

The hepatitis C virus (HCV) is a major etiologic agent for severe liver diseases (e.g. cirrhosis, fibrosis and hepatocellular carcinoma). Approximately 140 million people have chronic HCV infections and about 500 000 die yearly from HCV-related liver pathologies. To date, there is no licensed vaccine available to prevent HCV infection and production of a HCV vaccine remains a major challenge. H...

The most commonly used serodiagnostic antigens for trichinellosis are the excretory-secretory (ES) antigens from T. spiralis muscle larvae (ML), but the specific antibodies against the ML ES antigens are usually negative during early stage of Trichinella infection. The recent studies demonstrated that T. spiralis adult worm (AW) antigens were recognized by mouse or swine infection sera on Weste...

Background: Secretory proteins of IgE receptor activated mast cells and basophils play a pivotal role in the generation of immediate and long term immune responses in allergy and type I hypersensitivity. Objective: The present study aims to generate a 2-D map and profile of proteins secreted from a high secretory variant of the rat basophilic leukemia cell line, RBL-2H3.1, which in view of the ...

Background: Rat prostate gland which is used in various investigation has considerable morphological differences with other mammals. There are few reports about its structure. So, this study was carried on for determining of histomorphological structure of rat prostate. Materials and Methods: Five healthy adult male rats with average weight 20 ± 180 g and approximately 3 - 3.5 months age were s...

In the present study, pancreas glands in Mehraban breed of female sheep were histomorphometricallystudied in four different age groups included: fetus, newborn, sexually mature and old ages. The results ofhistomorphometrical analysis with regard to frequency and percentage of parenchymal and stromal structures such as, exocrine secretory units, secretory ducts, blood vessels, islets of Langerha...

Due to its role in human Trichinellosis, there are increasing global requirements for reliable diagnostic method for Trichinella spiralis infection in pigs. Consequently, there is a need for selection of potent diagnostic antigen that could be successfully utilized in the diagnosis. Currently, two antigens (somatic and excretory-secretory antigens of T. spiralis larvae) were evaluated for the d...

For the surveillance of trichinellosis, the digestion method is reliable but also labour intensive. The serological methods for the detection of Trichinella-specific antibodies using ELISA offer a sensitive and relatively specific alternative. For serological studies, sera or plasma from blood samples are the most common source of antibodies, but although the concentration of antibodies is appr...

subclass and is closely related to Fc-fragment of G3immunoglobulins. The predominant N-terminal amino acid of this protein is glutamic acid in the uncyclized form, and that of another -yHCD is glycine. Studies of the N-terminal peptides indicate that the N-terminal portion of the y3-heavy polypeptide chain is absent from the -yHCD-JM. These findings rule out a process of normal heavy chain init...

Taenia solium is a plane helminth responsible for taeniasis and human cysticercosis, the latter being the result of the consumption of infective eggs. Cysticerci can develop in different human tissues, often in the central nervous system, causing neurocysticercosis (NCC). For the diagnosis of NCC, an adequate interpretation of clinical data, neuroimaging results and serological tests are requir...