Pathology of adenoviral infection in turkeys (Meleagris gallopavo) with respiratory disease and colisepticemia.

Nuclear inclusion bodies typical of the adenovirus group were widespread in in the spleen and other tissues of 8-week-old turkeys with severe respiratory disease and concomitant evidence of colisepticemia. Adenoviral virions were seen in affected nuclei of splenic tissue and in negatively stained preparations of ground spleen. In splenic tissue, inclusions were most prominent in reticular cells and macrophages in the periarterial lymphoid sheaths, the red pulp and the marginal zones of the periarteriolar reticular sheaths. Marked reticuloendothelial hyperplasia, lymphoid atrophy and granulocytic splenitis characterized the splenic changes. There were inclusions in the respiratory tract, intestinal tract, liver, kidney and pancreas. Inoculation of young turkeys, especially when immunosuppressed, resulted in evidence of infection and respiratory disease. The viruses produced cytopathic changes in primary turkey kidney cell cultures but did not affect embryonating chicken eggs. Concentrated viral suspensions induced precipitin lines in agar gel immunodiffusion tests with known antisera against known turkey adenoviruses but did not show an antigenic relationship to chicken adenoviruses.     

R factor types found in Salmonella typhimurium and Escherichia coli isolated from calves in a confined environment.

Typing of R factors by genetic properties was done with Salmonella typhimurium and Escherichia coli isolated from calves on a feedlot where epizootics of clinical or subclinical calf salmonellosis had repeatedly occurred during 5 years. Forty-nine R factors from S typhimurium were fi- (no fertility inhibition) and spp- (no restriction against phage lambda vir). Twenty-three (46.9%) of them belonged to compatibility group Ialpha and the remainder were nontypable. Fourteen R factors from E coli belonged to different genetic types: fi+ (11=78.6%) and fi- (3=21.4%); spp+ (1=7.1%) and spp- (13=92.9%); compatibility groups FII (5=35.7%), N (1=7.1%), and nontypable (8=57.2%). In contrast to the R factors of S typhimurium, 9 (64.3%) of the 14 R factors of E coli carried resistance against aminobenzyl penicillin with or without kanamycin resistance. The compatibility groups of R factors of S typhimurium seemed to be useful as a subsidiary epizootiologic marker in this feedlot.     

Peritoneal biphasic mesothelioma in a dog

A 10-year-old German shepherd dog was presented with a severe abdominal distension. At necropsy, whitish and firm mass was observed in the mesentery with metastases in the pericardium and pleura. The intestinal serosa was thickened and stiff. Histologically, the tumours were composed of a biphasic population of cells, which reacted with cytokeratin, vimentin and Wilms' tumour 1 protein antibody. Ultrastructural examination revealed numerous microvilli, abundant rough endoplasmic reticulum, numerous desmosomes and bundles of microfilament. The tumour was classified as biphasic mesothelioma of peritoneal origin.