Filogenic study of Mycoplasma bovis isolated from cattle with mastitis and etinologic study of the main contagious agents causing mastitis: Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus agalactiae

• Grant number: 11/21009-0
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: March 01, 2012
• End date: February 28, 2014
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Veterinary Medicine - Preventive Veterinary Medicine
• Principal Investigator: Helio Langoni
• Grantee: Helio Langoni
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Medicina Veterinária e Zootecnia (FMVZ). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Botucatu. Botucatu , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Mastitis is the inflammation in mammary glands, characterized as the most common infectious disease in milk cattle. This infirmity causes great harm, both because of the fall of production and quality of milk and because of the increase of the treatment costs and because of the early discard of cattle that present chronic mastitis. The main mastitis agents are: Staphylococcus aureus, Streptococcus agalactiae and Mycoplasma spp.. The intramammary infection caused by these agents can turn into a serious problem to dairy herds. It is hard to treat, because the microorganisms are resistant to most of the antimicrobial drugs used and mastitis can become chronic and with high count of somatic cells (CCS). In the majority of the studies in mastitis, the prevalence of agents as Streptococcus agalactiae and Staphylococcus aureus is reported. Because these agents can be isolated and identified with the conventional microbiological methods; however, Mycoplasma bovis needs special methods and conditions. Therefore, it is believed that the real prevalence of Mycoplasma bovis is, probably, underestimated. Because of that, the present study aims at isolating and genotyping strains of Mycoplasma bovis from Milk samples, verifying, then, the real prevalence of this agent in milk and teats of animals with mastitis, plus the etiologic study of mastitis based on the most contagious agents: Staphylococcus aureus and Streptococcus agalactiae. (AU)