Identification and characterization of bacterial etiologies in pigs with sudden death

Tzu-Ming Huang

Abstract

To prevent the invasion of African Swine Fever (ASF), suddenly-died pigs were submitted to AHRI for ASF examination, and also bacterial isolation to clarify the etiology. In 2019, three cases from southern Taiwan were submitted to the Bacteriology Lab. Traditional enrichment and isolation, biochemical characterization, serotyping, and antimicrobial susceptibility was carried out. In addition, modern molecular technology was performed to confirm the species and serovar identification, virulence factor, and antimicrobial resistance. Salmonella enterica was isolated from several organs among two cases and Salmonella enterica subspecies enterica serotype Choleraesuis was identified by sequence comparison, and Erysipelothrix rhusiopathiae was isolated from the spleen of the other case. The antimicrobial susceptibilities of two isolates of S. Choleraesuis and one isolate of E. rhusiopathiae showed resistance to multiple antimicrobials. According to the previous findings, it was assumed that it is easy to find multidrug resistance in the etiologies of sudden-died pigs.

Identification of bat species by DNA barcoding

Shu-Chia HU

Abstract

Bats belong to the order Chiroptera, which is the largest order of mammals next only to rodents (order Rodentia). More than 1,400 species of bats are identified in the world, and 37 bat species are identified in Taiwan till now. External features is commonly used to identify bat species, such as facial characteristic, outline of ear, shape of tragus. The molecular method called DNA barcoding, which uses short standardized DNA sequence of the host to distinguish the animal species is frequently used now. This study used polymerase chain reaction to amplify the partial mitochondrial DNA (cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1, NADH dehydrogenase subunit 1 and cytochrome b) of 13 bat species, and analyzed the mtDNA sequence to distinguish the species to improve the species identification of bat in laboratory in the future.