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Background: Cerebellar cortical degeneration (CCD) is an increasingly recognised neurodegenerative disease process affecting many dog breeds. Typical presentation consists of a progressive cerebellar ataxia, with a variable age at onset and rate of progression between different breeds. Cerebellar histopathological findings typically consist of primary Purkinje neuronal degeneration and loss, with variable secondary depletion of the granular and molecular cell layers. Causative genes have been identified associated with CCD in several breeds, allowing screening for selective breeding to reduce the prevalence of these conditions. There have been no previous reports of CCD in Hungarian Vizslas. Results: Two full-sibling Hungarian Vizsla puppies from a litter of nine presented with a history of progressive ataxia, starting around three months of age. Clinical signs included marked hypermetric and dysmetric ataxia, truncal sway, intention tremors and absent menace responses, with positional horizontal nystagmus in one dog. Routine diagnostic investigations were unremarkable, and magnetic resonance imaging performed in one dog revealed mild craniodorsal cerebellar sulci widening, supportive of cerebellar atrophy. Owners of both dogs elected for euthanasia shortly after the onset of signs. Histopathological examination revealed primary Purkinje neuron loss consistent with CCD. Whole genome sequencing was used to successfully identify a disease-associated splice donor site variant in the sorting nexin 14 gene (SNX14) as a strong causative candidate. An altered SNX14 splicing pattern for a CCD case was demonstrated by RNA analysis, and no SNX14 protein could be detected in CCD case cerebellum by western blotting. SNX14 is involved in maintaining normal neuronal excitability and synaptic transmission, and a mutation has recently been found to cause autosomal recessive cerebellar ataxia and intellectual disability syndrome in humans. Genetic screening of 133 unaffected Hungarian Vizslas revealed the presence of three heterozygotes, supporting the presence of carriers in the wider population. Conclusions: This is the first report of CCD in Hungarian Vizsla dogs and identifies a highly associated splice donor site mutation in SNX14, with an autosomal recessive mode of inheritance suspected. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Research antibodies are used by thousands of scientists working in diverse disciplines, but it is common to hear concerns about antibody quality. This means that researchers need to carefully choose the antibodies they use to avoid wasting time and money. A well accepted way of selecting a research antibody is to identify one which has been used previously, where the associated data has been peer-reviewed and the results published. Description CiteAb is a searchable database which ranks antibodies by the number of times they have been cited. This allows researchers to easily find antibodies that have been used in peerreviewed publications and the accompanying citations are listed, so users can check the data contained within the publications. This makes CiteAb a useful resource for identifying antibodies for experiments and also for finding information to demonstrate antibody validation. The database currently contains 1,400,000 antibodies which are from 90 suppliers, including 87 commercial companies and 3 academic resources. Associated with these antibodies are 140,000 publications which provide 306,000 antibody citations. In addition to searching, users can also browse through the antibodies and add their own publications to the CiteAb database. Conclusion CiteAb provides a new way for researchers to find research antibodies that have been used successfully in peer-reviewed publications. It aims to assist these researchers and will hopefully help promote progress in many areas of life science research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]