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Diagnostic tests for veterinary surveillance programs should be efficient, easy to use and, possibly, economical. In this context, classic Enzyme linked ImmunoSorbent Assay (ELISA) remains the most common analytical platform employed for serological analyses. The analysis of pooled samples instead of individual ones is a common procedure that permits to certify, with one single test, entire herds as “disease-free”. However, diagnostic tests for pooled samples need to be particularly sensitive, especially when the levels of disease markers are low, as in the case of anti-BoHV1 antibodies in milk as markers of Infectious Bovine Rhinotracheitis (IBR) disease. The avidin-nucleic-acid-nanoassembly (ANANAS) is a novel kind of signal amplification platform for immunodiagnostics based on colloidal poly-avidin nanoparticles that, using model analytes, was shown to strongly increase ELISA test performance as compared to monomeric avidin. Here, for the first time, we applied the ANANAS reagent integration in a real diagnostic context. The monoclonal 1G10 anti-bovine IgG1 antibody was biotinylated and integrated with the ANANAS reagents for indirect IBR diagnosis from pooled milk mimicking tank samples from herds with IBR prevalence between 1 to 8%. The sensitivity and specificity of the ANANAS integrated method was compared to that of a classic test based on the same 1G10 antibody directly linked to horseradish peroxidase, and a commercial IDEXX kit recently introduced in the market. ANANAS integration increased by 5-fold the sensitivity of the 1G10 mAb-based conventional ELISA without loosing specificity. When compared to the commercial kit, the 1G10-ANANAS integrated method was capable to detect the presence of anti-BHV1 antibodies from bulk milk of gE antibody positive animals with 2-fold higher sensitivity and similar specificity. The results demonstrate the potentials of this new amplification technology, which permits improving current classic ELISA sensitivity limits without the need for new hardware investments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chronic gastro-duodenal reflux in the esophagus is a major risk for intestinal metaplasia and Barrett’s adenocarcinoma. A role for chronic use of proton pump inhibitor (PPI) in the increased incidence of esophageal adenocarcinoma in Western countries has been previously suggested. The aim of this work was to study the effect of chronic administration of omeprazole (a proton pump inhibitor) per os in a model of reflux induced esophageal carcinogenesis. One week after esophago-gastro-jejunostomy, 115 Sprague-Dawley rats were randomized to receive 10 mg/Kg per day of omeprazole or placebo, 5 days per week. The esophago-gastric specimens were collected 28±2 weeks after randomization and analyzed in a blinded fashion. Mortality and esophageal metaplasia rates did not differ between the two groups (p = 0.99 for mortality, p = 0.36 for intestinal metaplasia and p = 0.66 for multi-layered epithelium). Gastric pancreatic acinar cell metaplasia (PACM) was more frequently observed in PPI-treated rats (p = 0.003). Severe ulcer lesions significantly prevailed in the placebo group (p = 0.03). Locally invasive esophageal epithelial neoplasia were observed in 23/39 PPI-treated versus 14/42 placebo-animals (p = 0.03). In conclusion, chronic omeprazole treatment improved the healing of esophageal ulcerative lesions. Locally invasive neoplastic lesions and PACM prevailed among PPI-treated animals. However, neither an effect on the overall mortality nor on the incidence of pre-neoplastic lesions was observed in this work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chronic gastro-duodenal reflux in the esophagus is a major risk for intestinal metaplasia and Barrett's adenocarcinoma. A role for chronic use of proton pump inhibitor (PPI) in the increased incidence of esophageal adenocarcinoma in Western countries has been previously suggested. The aim of this work was to study the effect of chronic administration of omeprazole (a proton pump inhibitor) per os in a model of reflux induced esophageal carcinogenesis. One week after esophago-gastro-jejunostomy, 115 Sprague-Dawley rats were randomized to receive 10 mg/Kg per day of omeprazole or placebo, 5 days per week. The esophago-gastric specimens were collected 28 ± 2 weeks after randomization and analyzed in a blinded fashion. Mortality and esophageal metaplasia rates did not differ between the two groups (p = 0.99 for mortality, p = 0.36 for intestinal metaplasia and p = 0.66 for multi-layered epithelium). Gastric pancreatic acinar cell metaplasia (PACM) was more frequently observed in PPI-treated rats (p = 0.003). Severe ulcer lesions significantly prevailed in the placebo group (p = 0.03). Locally invasive esophageal epithelial neoplasia were observed in 23/39 PPI-treated versus 14/42 placebo-animals (p = 0.03). In conclusion, chronic omeprazole treatment improved the healing of esophageal ulcerative lesions. Locally invasive neoplastic lesions and PACM prevailed among PPI-treated animals. However, neither an effect on the overall mortality nor on the incidence of pre-neoplastic lesions was observed in this work.