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Despite the impact of duck hepatitis virus type 1 (DHAV) as economically important and devastating pathogen in duck industry, there is a scarcity of data on the pathogenesis of DHAV. In this study, 1-day old ducklings were orally inoculated with DHAV-3 isolate (DHAV-3/duck-wt/KOR/Y02-1/2012) and DRL-62 strain as control virus in addition to mock-inoculated group. These strains induced the same clinical signs and gross lesions in virus-inoculated ducklings. The clinical signs appeared at HPI 24 and the mortalities were recorded by HPI 36. Histopatholoically, both strains induced the same characteristic liver lesions: hepatocyte necrosis, lymphoid cell infiltration in the portal triad and bile duct hyperplasia. Different microscopic lesions were also observed in extra-hepatic organs and tissues. By RT-PCR and nested PCR, viral RNA was detected in liver, spleen, brain, kidney, lung, heart, pancreas, bursa of Fabricious and thymus. An immunofluorescence assay confirmed virus antigen localization in these organs and tissues. Serum biochemical analysis revealed a significant hypoalbuminemia which reached the lowest level by HPI 24. These results indicated that DHAV-1 or 3 have a strong liver tropism and a pantropic effect with wide damage to various organs and tissues. The lesions of spleen, bursa of Fabricious and thymus indicated that the immune function might be affected by the DHAV infection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study on the genetic diversity and prevalence of the bovine group C rotaviruses (GCRVs) in diarrhea fecal samples from Korean native beef calf herds using real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and nested PCR. The researchers used four sets of GCRV gene primer pairs in order to detect bovine GCRVs sensitively. They also used 1.5 or 2 percent agarose gel electrophoresis to analyze the amplification products and used the ultraviolet irradiation of ethidium bromide-stained samples to visualize them. They found that porcine-like GCRV strains and other genetically diverse Korean bovine GCRV strains are circulating in South Korea.