Life Sciences Commons^™

A Comparison Of Paraffin Histology And Hemolymph Analysis For The Diagnosis Of Haplosporidium Nelsoni (Msx) In Crassostrea Virginica (Gmelin), Eugene M. Burreson, M.Elizabeth Robinson, Antonio Villalba

VIMS Articles

Diagnosis of the oyster pathogen Haplosporidium nelsoni (MSX) by paraffin histology is compared with a technique in which hemolymph drawn from the oyster adductor muscle sinus is examined for parasite plasmodia. Oysters from seed beds of the James River, Virginia imported to an MSX endemic area in May, 1986 were sampled monthly through December, 1986 and in February, 1987. A sample of 25 oysters was bled each month and then processed for sectioning. Of the 200 oysters sampled, 89 (44.5%) were diagnosed as infected using histology and 61 (30.5%) were diagnosed as infected using hemolymph examination. All the heavy and …

Development And Evaluation Of Techniques To Study Acquired Immunity To Perkinsus Marinus In The Oyster, Crassostrea Virginica (Gmelin), Fu-Lin Chu

VIMS Articles

This paper describes a radiometric technique developed to measure phagocytosis of Perkinsus marinus zoospores by oyster hemocytes. The spores of P. marinus were radiolabeled by culturing P. marinus presporangia and sporangia in estuarine water (22%o) containing 14C-glycine. The percent of spores phagocytized by hemocytes was determined by the uptake of radioactivity by hemocytes.

Results from preliminary experiments to test the efficiency of using an osmotic infiltration method for immunizing oysters are also reported. It was found that oysters can take up both dissolved antigen (radiolabeled bovine serum albumin) and particulate antigen ( 14C-labeled zoospore homogenate) through osmotic infiltration. The uptake …