Background and Aims: Influenza (flu) is a respiratory infection in mammals and birds. It is caused by an RNA virus in the family Orthomyxoviridae. The virus is divided into three main types. Influenza virus type A is found in a wide variety of bird and mammal species and can undergo major shifts in immunological properties. Hemagglutinin (HA) is an important influenza virus surface antigen that...

During the 2009 H1N1 influenza A outbreak, 773 children were tested for influenza by direct fluorescent-antibody testing with PCR confirmation. Direct fluorescent-antibody testing has a specificity of 99.6% but a sensitivity of only 65.0%. Physicians should recognize diagnostic limitations of direct fluorescent-antibody testing, which missed one-third of infected individuals.

background: influenza viruses are a significant cause of morbidity and mortality. the influenza virus pandemics, 1918, 1977, and especially the most recent one, a/h1n1/2009, made evident the need for generating recombinant influenza h1n1 antigens which are essential to develop both basic and applied research programs. among influenza virus proteins, haemagglutinin (ha) is a major surface antige...

We evaluated the performance of four rapid influenza diagnostic test methods (RIDT) compared to real-time reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (rRT-PCR), for the detection of the novel swine-origin influenza A (H1N1) virus (S-OIV) in August 2009. A total of 270 respiratory specimens were tested with rRT-PCR, where 74 of these were tested by BinaxNow (Inverness), 80 by QuickVue (Quide...

The spread of influenza has usually been described by a 'density' model, where the largest centres of population drive the epidemic within a country. An alternative model emphasizing the role of air travel has recently been developed. We have examined the relative importance of the two in the context of the 2009 H1N1 influenza epidemic in Scotland. We obtained genome sequences of 70 strains rep...

The rapidSTRIPE H1N1 test, based on a nucleic acid lateral-flow assay, has been developed for diagnosis of a swine-origin influenza A (H1N1) virus. This test is simple and cost-effective and allows specific detection of the S-OIV A (H1N1) virus from swab sampling to final detection on a lateral-flow stripe within 2 to 3 h.

The emergence of the pandemic 2009 H1N1 influenza A virus in humans and subsequent discovery that it was of swine influenza virus lineages raised concern over the safety of pork. Pigs experimentally infected with pandemic 2009 H1N1 influenza A virus developed respiratory disease; however, there was no evidence for systemic disease to suggest that pork from pigs infected with H1N1 influenza woul...

Background and Aims: Influenza is one of the main respiratory infections of humans, responsible for 300,000–500,000 annual deaths world-wide. Vaccination is one of the best ways to prevent infections including influenza. Influenza virosomes are virus-like particles, which retain the cell binding and membrane fusion properties of the native virus, but lack the ribonucleoprotein (RNP). A vi...