Nuevos modelos animales para el estudio de la infección por "Neospora caninum" durante la gestación

Abstract

Neospora caninum is an apicomplexan protozoan parasite considered to be one of the main causes of abortion in cattle worldwide. It shows a high prevalence and produces important economic losses as a consequence of the reproductive failure triggered by infection during pregnancy or recrudescence. To date, immunoprofilaxis is considered the best control strategy against the disease. Unfortunately, there are no current drugs or vaccines available in the market against Neospora, since the only vaccine commercialised so far (Neoguard) was withdrawn from the market on account of the low efficacy shown. Therefore, a large amount of research focuses its efforts on the development of new candidates that may be effective in protecting against abortion and vertical transmission. For this purpose, animal models, besides being of great utility for the study of parasite-host relationship, immune responses or pathogenesis, are essential tools for performing an appropriate assessment of the efficacy and safety of vaccines and drugs. However, there is not a normalized model of neosporosis, since the models described in the literature differ in the experimental designs employed. These include, among others, the strain or breed of animals used, the N. caninum isolate, the parasite manipulation for infection, route of administration and dose. Besides, for pregnant models, the time of gestation when infection takes place implies an important additional variable. All of this leads to a high degree of variability, rendering meaningful comparison of results from different laboratories a difficult task. Therefore, the elaboration of common models achieving a consensus among different laboratories is necessary, so as to permit comparison and validation of results obtained in each one of them ...