Magic™ Anti-NDV Monoclonal antibody, Clone N29723OX2

Tropical cyclones (TCs) are extreme weather events that frequently occur along the coast of northwestern Mexico, but an assessment of dry forest damage on this area after their impact had not been investigated yet. Thus, the effect of strong winds and high precipitation rates were analyzed for the first time on the dry forests of the southern tip of the Baja California peninsula. An analysis was performed on the development of the TC Odile (2014) with winds above 200 km/h and TC Lidia (2017) with high precipitation rates in excess of 400 mm/day. The study used remote sensing tools to calculate changes in land areas from the vegetation indices and the non-photosynthetic vegetation (NPV). The results showed a noticeable drop in the enhanced vegetation index (Delta EVI = 0.15) few days after Odile's landfall; after Lidia, the EVI values rose while the spatial distribution of changes on the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) and NPV showed the effect of large precipitation rates on vegetation damage. Intense winds from Odile triggered large changes in NDV-I with an increase of NPV. This study provides insight into the sensitivity of this ecosystem to strong winds and heavy rainfall on the magnitude of vegetation damage.

Newcastle disease virus (NDV), the type member of the species Avian avulavirus 1 (formerly known as avian paramyxovirus serotype 1), causes a highly contagious and economically important disease in a myriad of avian species around the globe. While extensive vaccination programs have been implemented in ND-endemic countries, the disease is continuously spreading in commercial, backyard, and wild captive poultry. In order to investigate the evolution of the virus and assess the efficiency of the vaccine regimens that are currently being applied in commercial poultry, four wild-bird-origin NDV strains were characterized biologically, based on mean death time and intracerebral pathogenicity index, and genetically, based on the cleavage motif ((112)RRQKRF(117)) in the fusion (F) protein. Based on these features, all of the isolates were characterized as velogenic strains of NDV. Phylogenetic analysis based on the complete genome sequence revealed clustering of these isolates within class II, genotype VII. This class of NDV remains the predominant genotype in the Egyptian poultry industry, as well as in those of many Asian and African countries. To investigate the potential of these wild-bird-origin NDV isolates to cause infection in domesticated poultry and to assess the efficacy of currently available vaccines for protection of commercial poultry, an extensive animal challenge experiment was performed. Cumulative clinicopathological and immunological investigations of virus-challenged chickens indicate that these isolates can potentially be transmitted between chicken and cause systemic infections, and the currently applied vaccines are unable to prevent clinical disease and virus shedding. Taken together, the data represent a comprehensive evaluation of the ability of Egyptian wild-bird-origin NDV strains to cause infection in commercial poultry and highlights the need for a continuous and large-scale surveillance as well as revised vaccine approaches. These integrated and multifaceted strategies would be crucial in any efforts to control and eradicate the disease globally.