Veterinary Preventive Medicine, Epidemiology, and Public Health Commons^™

Environmental Sampling Techniques For Herd-Level Surveillance Of Bovine Viral Diarrhea Virus, Jaden Carlson

School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Control of Bovine Viral Diarrhea Virus (BVDV) relies on resource-intensive individual animal sampling to detect and remove persistently infected (PI) cattle. Herd-level surveillance tools would be useful for herds with unknown BVDV status and for monitoring herds with BVDV-free status. The overall objective of this thesis is to explore the viability of BVDV surveillance at a herd-level using samples collected without handling individual animals. The first objective was to determine the feasibility of using stable flies as a sampling tool to detect BVDV. The second objective was to determine the feasibility of using drinking water to detect BVDV. To accomplish …

Prevalence Of Tick-Borne Pathogens In Small Mammals And White-Tailed Deer In Southeast Nebraska, Tim Hotaling

School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The prevalence of tick-borne diseases has been increasing in the United States for the past couple decades. Studies have been conducted throughout the US identifying tick-borne disease pathogens as well as their hosts and prevalence. Research was conducted in Nebraska to determine the presence of some tick-borne disease pathogens, their vectors, and their hosts, with emphasis made on Borrelia spp., Rickettsia rickettsii, and Ehrlichia chaffeensis.

Small rodents in southeast Nebraska were trapped and sampled at eight study sites using live capture traps. Captured rodents were assessed for active parasitism by ticks which were collected and placed in alcohol. …

The Current Prevalence Of Caprine Arthritis-Encephalitis Virus In Midwestern Goat Herds, Bradley Todd Jones Dvm

School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Caprine Arthritis-Encephalitis Virus (CAEV) is an incurable disease of goats that has both social and economic impacts. Clinical disease in goats includes encephalitis in kids; chronic arthritis, inflammatory mastitis and progressive respiratory disease in adults. In the last 25 years there have been significant changes in the US goat industry with rapid growth in the meat and dairy industries. Recent prevalence studies are lacking and historic studies may not reflect changes in the industry. The purpose of this study was to establish the prevalence of CAEV in Midwestern herds that are not routinely acquiring new animals from known negative CAEV …

Tactics For Identifying And Eliminating Tritrichomonas Foetus From Infected Beef Herds, Jeff D. Ondrak

School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The protozoan, Tritrichomonas foetus (TF), has been recognized as a cause of bovine infertility for more than 100 years (Skirrow and BonDurant, 1988). As an obligate parasite of the bovine reproductive tract its control and eradication seems achievable (Harding, 1950). However, this disease continues to trouble US cattle producers and a recent epidemic in the Western US has lead to increased interest in research and regulatory efforts (Cima, 2009).

Outbreak investigations were carried out on three Nebraska ranches to assess the efficiency of currently available diagnostic tests, culture, gel polymerase chain reaction (PCR), and real time PCR (rtPCR), in identifying …