Department of Veterinary Medicine Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2762
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Item FUNCTIONAL CHARACTERIZATION OF THE INTERACTION OF HEPATITIS E VIRUS ORF3 PRODUCT WITH THE CYTOSKELETON(2008) Kannan, Harilakshmi; Zhang, Yan-Jin; Veterinary Medical Science; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Hepatitis E virus (HEV) causes several outbreaks of hepatitis in humans. Many aspects of HEV pathogenesis are not well understood. The HEV ORF3 product (henceforth known as vp13) is a multifunctional protein essential for infection of animals. To better understand the vp13 functions, this study was performed. We observed that vp13 protein was associated with the microtubules (MT) in transfected cells. Mutational studies revealed that both hydrophobic domains at the N-terminal region of vp13 are required for the vp13-MT interaction. Our studies also showed that HEV vp13 protein increased the stability of the MT, activated the apoptotic pathway, and, increased the levels of tumor suppressor gene p53 and its downstream effector p21Cip/WAF1 in the transfected cells. However, no noticeable effect on cell survival was observed. These results indicated that HEV vp13 protein may act as a viral regulatory protein.Item Regulation of Virulence by BarA-UvrY Two-Component system and LuxS in Extraintestinal Pathogenic Escherichia coli.(2007-12-05) Palaniyandi, Senthilkumar; Mukhopadhyay, Suman; Veterinary Medical Science; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Pathogenic E. coli cause intestinal or extraintestinal infections in many host species. E. coli strains enter the intestinal tract through food and colonize the intestinal epithelium to cause infections. In animals and humans, E. coli causes gastroenteritis, neonatal meningitis and urinary tract infections. In birds, E. coli causes a complex syndrome called avian colibacillosis. The orthologs of BarA-UvrY two-component (TCS) system is known to regulate a number of phenotypic traits in gamma proteobacteria, although their role in Extraintestinal pathogenic Escherichia coli (ExPEC) virulence is yet to be determined. The barA gene is membrane bound sensor kinase protein and the uvrY gene encodes the cognate response regulator in E. coli. Work in this study has focused how the BarA-UvrY and LuxS system regulates in vivo virulence in uropathogenic E. coli (UPEC) and avian pathogenic E. coli (APEC) during infection. The main goal of this study is to look at how BarA-UvrY TCS and LuxS regulate virulence in APEC 7122 and UPEC CFT073. In this study, we studied the role of BarA-UvrY TCS system in regulation of virulence in the aforementioned ExPEC strains using animal model and tissue culture system and the role of LuxS in regulation of virulence determination in ExPEC. Our results indicate that BarA-UvrY regulates multiple virulence properties in APEC 7122 and UPEC CFT073 and that LuxS regulates partial virulence properties in APEC 7122 and UPEC CFT073.Item REVERSE GENETICS OF AVIAN METAPNEUMOVIRUS(2005-12-06) Dhanasekaran, Govindarajan; Samal, Siba K; Veterinary Medical Science; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Avian metapneumovirus (AMPV) causes an acute respiratory disease in turkeys and is associated with "swollen head syndrome" in chickens, contributing to significant economic losses to the US turkey industry. With a long-term goal of developing a better vaccine for controlling AMPV in the US, a reverse genetics system to produce infectious AMPV entirely form cloned cDNA was established. To achieve this, the unpublished sequences of the G gene, the L gene, the leader and trailer region were first determined to complete the entire genome sequence of AMPV subgroup C strain Colorado (AMPV/CO). Our results showed that the full-length AMPV/CO genome was 14,150 nucleotides (nt) in length, denoting that AMPV/CO possessed the longest genome among known metapneumoviruses. Subsequently, a cDNA clone encoding the entire 14,150 nt genome was generated by assembling 5 cDNA fragments, representing the entire genome, between the T7 RNA polymerase promoter and the autocatalytic hepatitis delta virus ribozyme of a low-copy number transcription plasmid pBR 322. Transfection of this plasmid, along with the expression plasmids encoding the N, P, M2-1 and L proteins of AMPV/CO, into cells stably expressing T7 RNA polymerase resulted in the recovery of infectious AMPV/CO. The recovered virus was observed to contain the genetic markers that were artificially introduced during cloning. Characterization of the recombinant AMPV/CO showed that its growth characteristics in tissue culture were similar to those of the parental virus. These results demonstrate that infectious AMPV can be generated entirely from cloned DNA using reverse genetics techniques. The potential of AMPV/CO to serve as a viral-vector was examined using green fluorescent protein (GFP) as a reporter. The recovered rAMPV/CO-GFP virus stably expressed GFP for at least five serial passages and showed characteristics similar to that of the parental virus, except that there was a one-log reduction in the virus titer. These results demonstrated that the established reverse genetics system can be utilized effectively for various studies involving AMPV molecular biology, pathogenesis and vaccine development.