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Viruses have evolved to use cellular pathways to their advantage, including the ubiquitin–proteasome pathway of protein degradation. In several cases, viruses produce proteins that highjack cellular E3 ligases to modify their substrate specificity in order to eliminate…

Suppression or elimination of vector populations is a tried and tested method for reducing vector-borne disease, and a key component of integrated control programs. Genetic methods have the potential to provide new and improved methods for vector control. The required…

Rhinoviruses cause serious morbidity and mortality as the major etiological agents of asthma exacerbations and the common cold. A major obstacle to understanding disease pathogenesis and to the development of effective therapies has been the lack of a small-animal model for…

European Community national reference laboratories participated in two inter-laboratory comparison tests in 2006 to evaluate the sensitivity and specificity of their ‘in-house’ ELISA and RT-PCR assays for the detection of bluetongue virus (BTV) antibodies and RNA. The first…

Adjuvants are substances that enhance immune responses and thus improve the efficacy of vaccination. Few adjuvants are available for use in humans, and the one that is most commonly used (alum) often induces suboptimal immunity for protection against many pathogens. There is…

There is a worldwide epidemic of increasingly drug-resistant TB. Bacillus Calmette-Guerin vaccination provides partial protection against disseminated disease in infants but poor protection against later pulmonary TB. Cell-mediated protection against respiratory virus…

The cattle major histocompatibility complex (MHC) region contains a variable number of classical class I genes encoding polymorphic, ubiquitously expressed molecules with a role in antigen presentation. Class I cDNA sequences have previously been reported that are thought to…

Major histocompatibility complex (MHC) class I chain-related (MIC) genes have been previously identified and characterised in human. They encode polymorphic class I-like molecules that are stress-inducible, and constitute one of the ligands of the activating natural killer…

Bluetongue virus (BTV), an insect-vectored emerging pathogen of both wild ruminants and livestock, has had a severe economic impact in agriculture in many parts of the world. The investigation of BTV replication and pathogenesis has been hampered by the lack of a reverse…