Co-infection of cattle with Fasciola hepatica or F. gigantica and Mycobacterium bovis: A systematic review

The liver flukes, Fasciola hepatica and F. gigantica, are common trematode parasites of livestock. F. hepatica is known to modulate the immune response, including altering the response to co-infecting pathogens. Bovine tuberculosis (bTB), caused by Mycobacterium bovis, is a chronic disease which is difficult to control and is of both animal welfare and public health concern. Previous research has suggested that infection with liver fluke may affect the accuracy of the bTB skin test, but direction of the effect differs between studies. In a systematic review of the literature, all experimental and observational studies concerning co-infection with these two pathogens were sought. Data were extracted on the association between fluke infection and four measures of bTB diagnosis or pathology, namely, the bTB skin test, interferon γ test, lesion detection and culture/bacterial recovery. Of a large body of literature dating from 1950 to 2019, only thirteen studies met the inclusion criteria. These included studies of experimentally infected calves, case control studies on adult cows, cross sectional abattoir studies and a herd level study. All the studies had a medium or high risk of bias. The balance of evidence from the 13 studies included in the review suggests that liver fluke exposure was associated with either no effect or a decreased response to all of the four aspects of bTB diagnosis assessed: skin test, IFN γ, lesion detection and mycobacteria cultured or recovered. Most studies showed a small and/or non-significant effect so the clinical and practical importance of the observed effect is likely to be modest, although it could be more significant in particular groups of animals, such as dairy cattle

Learning by Heart: Cultural Patterns in the Faunal Processing Sequence during the Middle Pleistocene

Social learning, as an information acquisition process, enables intergenerational transmission and the stabilisation of cultural forms, generating and sustaining behavioural traditions within human groups. Archaeologically, such social processes might become observable by identifying repetitions in the record that result from the execution of standardised actions. From a zooarchaeological perspective, the processing and consumption of carcasses may be used to identify these types of phenomena at the sites. To investigate this idea, several faunal assemblages from Bolomor Cave (Valencia, Spain, MIS 9-5e) and Gran Dolina TD10-1 (Burgos, Spain, MIS 9) were analysed. The data show that some butchery activities exhibit variability as a result of multiple conditioning factors and, therefore, the identification of cultural patterns through the resulting cutmarks presents additional difficulties. However, other activities, such as marrow removal by means of intentional breakage, seem to reflect standardised actions unrelated to the physical characteristics of the bones. The statistical tests we applied show no correlation between the less dense areas of the bones and the location of impacts. Comparison of our experimental series with the archaeological samples indicates a counter-intuitive selection of the preferred locus of impact, especially marked in the case of Bolomor IV. This fact supports the view that bone breakage was executed counterintuitively and repetitively on specific sections because it may have been part of an acquired behavioural repertoire. These reiterations differ between levels and sites, suggesting the possible existence of cultural identities or behavioural predispositions dependant on groups. On this basis, the study of patterns could significantly contribute to the identification of occupational strategies and organisation of the hominids in a territory. In this study, we use faunal data in identifying the mechanics of intergenerational information transmission within Middle Pleistocene human communities and provide new ideas for the investigation of occupational dynamics from a zooarchaeological approach

IFN-?? selectively suppresses a subset of TLR4-activated genes and enhancers to potentiate macrophage activation

Activation of macrophage proinflammatory and antimicrobial phenotypes is regulated by IFN-?? and LPS via synergistic induction of canonical, inflammatory NF-??B target genes. However, whether IFN-?? negatively regulates components of the LPS response, and how this may affect macrophage activation, is still unclear. Here we use combined transcriptomic and epigenomic approaches to find that IFN-?? selectively abrogates LPS-induced feedback and alters macrophage metabolic pathways by suppressing TLR4-mediated gene activation. In contrast to superinduction of inflammatory genes via enhancers that bind IRF1 and STAT1, IFN-?? represses target enhancers that bind STAT3. TLR4-activated but IFN-??-suppressed enhancers comprise two subsets discernable by differential regulation of histone acetylation and recruitment of STAT3, CDK8 and cohesin. Our findings thus show that IFN-?? suppresses feedback inhibitory and metabolic components of TLR responses to enhance macrophage activation; they also provide insights for IFN-??-mediated selective inhibition of TLR4-induced transcription. Such inhibition can contribute to severe and sustained inflammatory responses