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What can we learn from the oral intake of prions by sheep?
Author(s) -
Sales N
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
the journal of pathology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.964
H-Index - 184
eISSN - 1096-9896
pISSN - 0022-3417
DOI - 10.1002/path.1977
Subject(s) - scrapie , bovine spongiform encephalopathy , biology , infectious agent , virology , asymptomatic , transmission (telecommunications) , disease , incubation period , pathogenesis , lymph , transmissible spongiform encephalopathy , prion protein , infectious dose , immunology , medicine , pathology , virus , incubation , biochemistry , electrical engineering , engineering
The central nervous system is the ultimate target of prions, the agents responsible for fatal neurodegenerative diseases known as transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs). The neuro‐invasive phase and its related clinical signs take place after a long incubation period. During this asymptomatic phase, however, active transport and replication of the infectious agent take place in peripheral sites. The oral infection route has been extensively studied because of its implication in the recent epidemic of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) in cattle and of the resulting human cases of variant Creutzfeldt–Jakob disease (vCJD). Rodent models have been useful in studying some aspects of this pathogenesis. Now, new data on the initial steps of oral infection have been obtained in sheep. This species is naturally infected with scrapie by horizontal transmission and there is strong evidence implicating the oral route. Furthermore, the existence of resistant and susceptible genotypes offers the possibility of comparative studies. The data were obtained using surgical and biochemical procedures to modulate the efficiency of oral infection and show that, in sheep, the abnormal prion protein (PrP) associated with the infectious agent crosses the intact intestinal barrier at the level of the enterocytes and then passes rapidly into lymph. These steps are identical in susceptible and resistant sheep. Thereafter, replication takes place in lymphoid structures. Other results in the same study indicate that alimentary fluids almost completely degrade the PrP of the inoculum. Though not directly transposable to human diseases, in which it is not possible to study these early stages, these data allow the elaboration of a simplified concept for the pathogenesis of TSEs. They also suggest that human contamination at the level of the oral cavity might be more important than previously suspected. Copyright © 2006 Pathological Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.