Anti-M. tuberculosis MPT64 polyclonal antibody

Tuberculosis (TB) is the leading cause of death worldwide due to an infectious disease, causing around 1.6 million deaths each year. This situation has become more complicated by the emergence of drug-resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis (M.tb) and HIV-TB co-infection, which has significantly worsened TB prognosis and treatment. Despite years of intensive research, Bacille Calmette-Guerin (BCG) remains the only licensed vaccine and has variable efficacy. It provides protection against childhood TB but is not effective in adult pulmonary TB. As a result of intense research in understanding TB vaccinology, there are many new vaccine candidates in clinical development and many more in pre-clinical trials which aim either to replace or boost BCG vaccine. This review discusses the history of BCG vaccine development and summarizes limitations of the current vaccine strategy and recent advances in improving BCG immunization along with other new vaccines in clinical trials which are promising candidates for the future tuberculosis vaccinology program.

Background Bovine tuberculosis and tuberculosis are chronic infectious diseases caused by theMycobacterium tuberculosiscomplex members,Mycobacterium bovisandMycobacterium tuberculosis, respectively. Infection withM. bovisandM. tuberculosishave significant implications for wildlife species management, public health, veterinary disease control, and conservation endeavours. Results Here we describe the first use of the VetMAX (TM) Mycobacterium tuberculosiscomplex (MTBC) DNA quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) detection kit for African wildlife samples. DNA was extracted from tissues harvested from 48 African buffaloes and MTBC DNA was detected (test-positive) in all 26 M. bovisculture-confirmed animals with an additional 12 PCR-positive results in culture-negative buffaloes (originating from an exposed population). Of six MTBC-infected African rhinoceros tested, MTBC DNA was detected in antemortem and postmortem samples from five animals. The PCR was also able to detect MTBC DNA in samples from two African elephants confirmed to haveM. bovisandM. tuberculosisinfections (one each). Culture-confirmed uninfected rhinoceros and elephants' samples tested negative in the PCR assay. Conclusions These results suggest this new detection kit is a sensitive screening test for the detection of MTBC-infected African buffaloes, African elephants and white rhinoceros.