BACKGROUND Tritrichomonas foetus is an emergent and important enteric pathogen of cats, which causes prolonged diarrhoea in cats. CASE PRESENTATION This study describes a T. foetus infection in a seven-month-old, entire male domestic shorthair kitten with a six-month history of persistent large intestinal diarrhoea, faecal incontinence, prostration, apathy and weight loss. Parasites were micr...

The ability of the parasitic flagellate Tritrichomonas foetus to use various iron sources for its physiological requirements was studied. The siderophores ferrioxamine B, ferrichrome, triacetylfusarinine, coprogen, enterobactin and pyoverdine sustained growth of the cells under iron-limited conditions, and siderophore iron was incorporated into the major iron protein of T. foetus, ferredoxin. T...

I. Radioactive calcium has been used to study the placental transfer of Ca in ewes at three stages of gestation. 2. At each stage virtually all the radioactive Ca injected into a foetus was still present 5-6 h later and little or none was found in the mother or in a twin foetus if present. 3. I t was concluded that there is neither exchange of Ca between foetal and maternal pools nor transfer f...

Trials were conducted to compare a modification of a commercial medium with the 2 media currently used at the Veterinary Research Institute, Onderstepoort, for the isolation of Trichomonas foetus. An antifungal agent was also added to the medium. Results obtained proved the modified medium to be more reliable for the isolation of T. foetus than the other 2, and the addition of antifungal more e...