Biomarkers in horses are measurable indicators of biological processes, states, or conditions that can be used to assess health and disease. These biomarkers can be identified in various biological samples such as blood, urine, or tissue. They provide valuable information for diagnosing diseases, monitoring health status, and evaluating treatment responses in equine medicine. Common biomarkers in horses include enzymes, hormones, and metabolites, which may change in response to physiological or pathological conditions. This page compiles peer-reviewed research studies and scholarly articles that explore the identification, quantification, and application of biomarkers in equine health and disease management.
Luo QH, Chen ML, Chen ZL, Huang C, Cheng AC, Fang J, Tang L, Geng Y.The aminolycoside Gentamicin is a widely used antibiotic, applied in equine medicine. Despite its clinical use, concerns remain regarding the potential toxic side-effects, such as nephrotoxicity. Early detection of renal damage is critical in preclinical drug development. This study was aimed to determine whether kidney injury molecule-1 (KIM-1) and neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL) may be early indicators in the assessment of Gentamycin-induced nephrotoxicity. Methods: In our study, a model of Gentamicin-induced nephrotoxicity in male Sprague Dawley rats treated for up to 7 da...
Hussein H, Dulin J, Smanik L, Drost WT, Russell D, Wellman M, Bertone A.Our investigations evaluated the effect of VEL-0230, a highly specific irreversible inhibitor of cathepsin K (CatK). The objectives of our study were to determine whether repeated dosing of a CatK inhibitor (CatKI) produced a desired inhibition of the bone resorption biomarker (CTX-1), and document the effect of repeated dosing on bone homeostasis, structure, and dynamics of bone resorption and formation in horses. Twelve young exercising horses were randomized in a prospective, controlled clinical trial and received 4 weekly doses of a CatKI or vehicle. Baseline and poststudy nuclear scintigr...
Bertuglia A, Pagliara E, Grego E, Ricci A, Brkljaca-Bottegaro N.Joint impact injuries initiate a progressive articular damage finally leading to post-traumatic osteoarthritis (PTOA). Racehorses represent an ideal, naturally available, animal model of the disease. Standardbred racehorses developing traumatic osteoarthritis of the fetlock joint during the first year of their career were enrolled in our study. Age-matched controls were contemporarily included. Biomarker levels of equine osteoarthritis were measured in serum and synovial fluid (SF) at baseline, and repeated yearly over the next 4 years of training (from T1 to T4). The effect of time and disea...
Pacholewska A, Mach N, Mata X, Vaiman A, Schibler L, Barrey E, Gerber V.MiRNAs regulate multiple genes at the post-transcriptional level and therefore play an important role in many biological processes. It has been suggested that miRNA exported outside the cells contribute to inter-cellular communication. Consequently, circulating miRNAs are of particular interest and are promising biomarkers for many diseases. The number of miRNAs annotated in the horse genome is much lower compared to model organisms like human and mouse. We therefore aimed to identify novel equine miRNAs for tissue types and breed in serum. We analysed 71 small RNA-seq libraries derived from n...
Semik E, Gurgul A, Ząbek T, Ropka-Molik K, Koch C, Mählmann K, Bugno-Poniewierska M.Equine sarcoids are the most commonly detected skin tumours in Equidae. In the present research, a comparative transcriptomic analysis was performed which aimed at looking inside a tumour biology and identification of the expression profile as a potential source of cancer specific genes useful as biomarkers. We have used Horse Gene Expression Microarray data from matched equine sarcoids and tumour-distant skin samples. In total, 901 significantly differentially expressed genes (DEGs) between lesional and healthy skin samples have been identified (fold change ≥ 2; P < 0.05). The la...
Fotschki J, Szyc AM, Laparra JM, Markiewicz LH, Wróblewska B.The aim of this study was to examine immune adaptive changes, the expression of innate biomarkers and variations in intestinal microbiota composition after horse-milk administration in BALB/c mice, which were sensitized intraperitoneally using cow β-lactoglobulin and α-casein with aluminum adjuvant. We measured serum antibody IgE levels and the expression of MCP-1, IL-4, and TNF-α in duodenal samples. Changes in immune cell populations in peripheral blood were quantified using flow cytometry, and intestinal microbiota composition was assessed using real-time PCR. We found that horse-milk ad...
Barrachina L, Remacha AR, Soler L, García N, Romero A, Vázquez FJ, Vitoria A, Álava MÁ, Lamprave F, Rodellar C.Acute phase proteins are useful inflammatory markers in horses. Haptoglobin (Hp) serum level is increased in horses undergoing different inflammatory processes, including arthritis. However, Hp concentration has not been assessed in inflammatory synovial fluid (SF). The aim of the present study was to investigate the Hp response in serum and SF in horses undergoing experimentally induced arthritis. For this purpose, serum and SF samples were collected from 12 animals before amphotericin B-induced arthritis was created (T0, healthy) and 15days after the lesion induction (T1, joint inflammation)...
van de Water E, Oosterlinck M, Dumoulin M, Korthagen NM, van Weeren PR, van den Broek J, Everts H, Pille F, van Doorn DA.Nutraceuticals are often used in the management of equine osteoarthritis, but scientific evidence of their efficacy is lacking. Objective: To study the preventive effects of two new nutraceuticals after the experimental induction of synovitis in comparison with positive and negative control treatments. Methods: Blinded, controlled, randomised experiment. Methods: Twenty-four healthy Standardbred horses were randomly allocated to supplement AT (multi-ingredient, 28 days), supplement HP (collagen hydrolysate, 60 days), meloxicam (4 days) or placebo (60 days). Synovitis was induced in the right i...
Isani G, Ferlizza E, Cuoghi A, Bellei E, Monari E, Bianchin Butina B, Castagnetti C.Characterisation of the physiologic equine amniotic fluid (AF) proteome is a prerequisite to study its changes during diseases and discover new biomarkers. The aim of this study was to identify by a proteomic approach the most abundant proteins of equine AF. AF samples were collected at parturition from 24 healthy mares that delivered healthy foals. All samples were subjected to sodium dodecyl sulphate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) on 4-12% gels. A pool of the 24 samples, after SDS-PAGE, was cut in 25 slices, trypsin-digested and analysed by mass spectrometry (MS) for protein i...
Leatherwood JL, Gehl KL, Coverdale JA, Arnold CE, Dabareiner RA, Walter KN, Lamprecht ED.Fourteen yearling Quarter horses (351 to 470 kg) were utilized in a randomized complete block design to evaluate potential of glucosamine hydrochloride (HCl) to mitigate intra-articular inflammation following a single inflammatory insult. Horses were blocked by BW, age, and sex, and randomly assigned to treatments for a 98-d experiment. Treatments consisted of a control diet (CON; = 7) fed 1% BW per d (as-fed) of concentrate only or a treatment diet ( = 7) of concentrate top dressed with 30 mg/kg BW glucosamine HCl (99.6% purity; GLU30) offered at 12 h intervals. Horses were maintained in indi...
Kusano K, Yamazaki M, Kiuchi M, Kaneko K, Koyama K.The oxidant and antioxidant equilibrium is known to play an important role in equine medicine and equine exercise physiology. There are abundant findings in this field; however, not many studies have been conducted for reference ranges of oxidative stress biomarkers in horses. This study was conducted to determine the reference values of reactive oxygen metabolites (d-ROMs) and biological antioxidant potential (BAP) using blood samples from 372 (191 males, 181 females) Thoroughbred racehorse aged 2 to 5 (3.43 ± 1.10 (mean ± SD)) years old. There were obvious gender differences in oxidative b...
Rombouts C, Jeanneau C, Camilleri J, Laurent P, About I.Adequate revascularization is a prerequisite for successful healing of periodontal bone defects. This study characterized three different xenogeneic bone grafting materials: Gen-Os of equine and porcine origins, and anorganic Bio-Oss. We also investigated their angiogenic potential. All materials were composed of poorly crystalline calcium oxide phosphate, with Bio-Oss exhibiting a carbonated phase and larger particle size and both Gen-Os showing the presence of collagen. Both Gen-Os materials significantly enhanced vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) secretion by PDL cells. A significan...
Menzies-Gow NJ, Harris PA, Elliott J.Certain individuals appear to be predisposed to recurrent pasture-associated laminitis. Previous studies have predominantly investigated risk factors only after disease occurrence. Objective: To investigate risk factors for pasture-associated laminitis prior to disease occurrence. Methods: Prospective cohort study. Methods: Non-laminitic ponies aged ≥7 years were recruited. Body condition score (BCS), height, weight, crest height and thickness were measured and an overnight dexamethasone suppression test performed. Plasma or serum adiponectin, leptin, triglyceride, basal insulin, insulin pos...
Marck A, Berthelot G, Foulonneau V, Marc A, Antero-Jacquemin J, Noirez P, Bronikowski AM, Morgan TJ, Garland T, Carter PA, Hersen P, Di Meglio JM....Locomotion is one of the major physiological functions for most animals. Previous studies have described aging mechanisms linked to locomotor performance among different species. However, the precise dynamics of these age-related changes, and their interactions with development and senescence, are largely unknown. Here, we use the same conceptual framework to describe locomotor performances in Caenorhabditis elegans, Mus domesticus, Canis familiaris, Equus caballus, and Homo sapiens. We show that locomotion is a consistent biomarker of age-related changes, with an asymmetrical pattern througho...
Rigoglio NN, Barreto RS, Favaron PO, Jacob JC, Smith LC, Gastal MO, Gastal EL, Miglino MA.The neural system is one of the earliest systems to develop and the last to be fully developed after birth. This study presents a detailed description of organogenesis of the central nervous system (CNS) at equine embryonic/fetal development between 19 and 115 days of pregnancy. The expression of two important biomarkers in the main structure of the nervous system responsible for neurogenesis in the adult individual, and in the choroid plexus, was demonstrated by Nestin and glial fibrillary acid protein (GFAP) co-labeling. In the 29th day of pregnancy in the undifferentiated lateral ventricle...
Hasan M, Siegmund W, Oswald S.Cytochrome P450 3A (CYP) enzymes are involved in the elimination of many drugs and are known to be regulated by several environmental factors. Thus, it was the aim of this study to develop and validate an analytical method allowing estimation of the hepatic CYP3A enzyme activity using the 4-hydroxycholesterol to cholesterol ratio as an endogenous biomarker in serum. Both compounds were isolated from the biological matrix by liquid-liquid extraction using n-hexane after saponification with ethanolic sodium methoxide solution (2M) to cleave the steroids from their esterified forms without any ki...
Muñoz PM, Ferrusola CO, Lopez LA, Del Petre C, Garcia MA, de Paz Cabello P, Anel L, Peña FJ.Stallion-to-stallion variability in the quality of cryopreserved ejaculates postthaw affects the commercial acceptability of frozen semen and thus is a major constraint for the equine industry. In recent years, the molecular mechanisms associated with sperm damage during cryopreservation have become better understood. Identification of the freezability of the ejaculates before the freezing process is initiated will have a major impact on the equine industry. We studied three markers of oxidative stress in sperm, including 8-iso-PGF2alpha, 8-OH guanosine, and 4-hydroxynonenal (4-HNE); the prese...
Banse HE, Holbrook TC, Frank N, McFarlane D.Local (skeletal muscle and adipose) and systemic inflammation are implicated in the development of obesity-associated insulin resistance in humans. In horses, obesity is neither strongly nor consistently associated with systemic inflammation. The role of skeletal muscle inflammation in the development of insulin dysregulation (insulin resistance or hyperinsulinemia) remains to be determined. We hypothesized that skeletal muscle inflammation is related to obesity-associated hyperinsulinemia in horses. Thirty-five light-breed horses with body condition scores (BCSs) of 3/9 to 9/9 were studied, i...
Unger L, Fouché N, Leeb T, Gerber V, Pacholewska A.Circulating miRNAs in body fluids, particularly serum, are promising candidates for future routine biomarker profiling in various pathologic conditions in human and veterinary medicine. However, reliable standardized methods for miRNA extraction from equine serum and fresh or archived whole blood are sorely lacking. We systematically compared various miRNA extraction methods from serum and whole blood after short and long-term storage without addition of RNA stabilizing additives prior to freezing. Time of storage at room temperature prior to freezing did not affect miRNA quality in serum. Fur...
Tuska P, Tóth B, Vásárhelyi G, Hangody L, Papp M, Bodó G.The purpose of this study was to evaluate changes in biomarker and synovial parameters following autologous osteochondral transplantation (AOT) in the equine stifle joint, to test the hypothesis whether synovial parameters would show significant differences at selected time points following the surgery (at days 3, 14, 60 and 180) compared to baseline level (at day 0). Surgical intervention was performed in both stifles of nine horses (n = 18). The joints were randomly assigned to operated and sham-operated groups. Grafts 8.5 mm in diameter were harvested from the femoropatellar (FP) joint unde...
Tsuzuki N, Sasaki N, Kusano K, Endo Y, Torisu S.Oxidative stress has been reported to occur during surgery. It is important to reduce intraoperative oxidative stress to improve the postoperative prognosis. However, there are no reports regarding oxidative stress related to surgery in horses. In the present study, we measured pre and postsurgical diacron-reactive oxygen metabolites (d-ROMs) and biological antioxidant potential (BAP); the oxidative stress index (OSI) was then calculated (OSI=d-ROMs/BAP × 100). d-ROMs were not significantly different between the pre and postsurgical periods. However, BAP significantly decreased after surgery ...
Niedzwiedz A, Borowicz H, Januszewska L, Markiewicz-Gorka I, Jaworski Z.It has been reported that equine recurrent airway obstruction (RAO) is a state of oxidative stress. Oxidant-antioxidant imbalance is known to increase the conversion of deoxyguanosine to 8-hydroxy-2-deoxyguanosine (8-OHdG) in DNA. 8-OHdG can easily be measured using ELISA tests in serum or urine samples. In this study, we analysed serum 8-OHdG levels in horses with recurrent airway obstruction and in healthy controls. Results: The study material consisted of seven healthy horses and seven horses with symptomatic RAO. All horses were exposed to moldy hay and straw for 48 h to induce clinical e...
Viscardi V, Jorge ML, Silva KM, Sad EP, Fonseca AB, Alencar NX, Lessa DA.Collection of fluid from the lower respiratory tract (LRT) plays an important role in both the pathophysiological investigation and diagnosis of respiratory tract disease. Enzymes such as ALP are, among others, indicators of cell damage or death, type II pneumocyte proliferation, and neutrophil invasion, and have been useful as biomarkers of respiratory disease in other species. Objective: The purpose of this study was to determine and compare tracheal wash (TW) ALP activity in healthy horses and horses with LRT inflammation (LRTI) determined by TW cytology profile. Methods: Tracheal washes we...
Fogle J, Jacob M, Blikslager A, Edwards A, Wagner B, Dean K, Fogle C.Clinically useful biomarkers are needed for early identification of endotoxaemic horses. Soluble CD14 (sCD14) is amplified early in response to inflammatory signals, including bacterial lipopolysaccharide (LPS), and may prove a useful biomarker for clinical endotoxaemia. Objective: The aim of this study was to determine if sCD14 could serve as a more reliable biomarker of the clinical signs of endotoxaemia, compared to measuring LPS alone. Methods: Prospective observational study in horses at a veterinary teaching hospital. Methods: Plasma samples were collected from 20 healthy horses and 35 h...
Flethøj M, Kanters JK, Haugaard MM, Pedersen PJ, Carstensen H, Balling JD, Olsen LH, Buhl R.OBJECTIVE To evaluate heart rate, heart rate variability, and arrhythmia frequency as well as changes in cardiac biomarker values and their association with heart rate in horses before and after an endurance ride. DESIGN Cross-sectional study. ANIMALS 28 Arabian horses competing in a 120- or 160-km endurance ride. PROCEDURES ECG recordings were obtained from each horse before (preride) and after (recovery) an endurance ride to evaluate changes in heart rate and the SD of normal R-R intervals (SDNN) during the initial 12 hours of recovery. Frequencies of supraventricular and ventricular prematu...
Mélo SK, Diniz AI, de Lira VL, de Oliveira Muniz SK, da Silva GR, Manso HE, Manso Filho HC.Oxidative stress has been correlated with pathologies that impair the performance of athlete horses. The aim of this study was to assess the effects of supplementation with a mixture of polyunsaturated oil and vitamin E on the antioxidant and haematological biomarkers of horses. Horses under maintenance care (n = 6) and horses in training (n = 10) received 100 and 300 ml of the oil mixture respectively. Supplementation was provided for a period of 8 weeks, together with isocaloric inclusion. Blood samples were collected at three time periods (pretest, after 4 weeks and after 8 weeks) t...
El-Bahr SM, El-Deeb WM.New biomarkers are essential for diagnosis of pyometra in mares. In this context, 12 subfertile Arabian mares suffered from pyometra were admitted to the Veterinary Teaching Hospital. The basis for diagnosis of pyometra was positive findings of clinical examination and rectal palpation. Blood samples were collected from diseased animals and from five Arabian healthy mares, which were considered as control group. Acute-phase proteins (APP), oxidative stress biomarkers, proinflammatory cytokines, and cardiac troponin I were estimated in the harvested sera of both groups. Clinical examination rev...
Nanda S, Dalai AK, Gökalp I, Kozinski JA.The organic wastes such as lignocellulosic biomass, municipal solid waste, sewage sludge and livestock manure have attracted attention as alternative sources of energy. Cattle manure, a waste generated in surplus amounts from the feedlot, has always been a chief environmental concern. This study is focused on identifying the candidacy of horse manure as a next generation feedstock for biofuel production through supercritical water gasification. The horse manure was gasified in supercritical water to examine the effects of temperature (400-600°C), biomass-to-water ratio (1:5 and 1:10) and reac...
Mort JS, Beaudry F, Théroux K, Emmott AA, Richard H, Fisher WD, Lee ER, Poole AR, Laverty S.To characterize the initial events in the cleavage of type II collagen mediated by cathepsin K and demonstrate the presence of the resulting products in human and equine articular osteoarthritic cartilage. Equine type II collagen was digested with cathepsin K and the cleavage products characterized by mass spectrometry. Anti-neoepitope antibodies were raised against the most N-terminal cleavage products and used to investigate the progress of collagen cleavage, in vitro, and the presence of cathepsin K-derived products in equine and human osteoarthritic cartilage. Six cathepsin K cleavage sit...
Mach N, Plancade S, Pacholewska A, Lecardonnel J, Rivière J, Moroldo M, Vaiman A, Morgenthaler C, Beinat M, Nevot A, Robert C, Barrey E.The adaptive response to extreme endurance exercise might involve transcriptional and translational regulation by microRNAs (miRNAs). Therefore, the objective of the present study was to perform an integrated analysis of the blood transcriptome and miRNome (using microarrays) in the horse before and after a 160 km endurance competition. A total of 2,453 differentially expressed genes and 167 differentially expressed microRNAs were identified when comparing pre- and post-ride samples. We used a hypergeometric test and its generalization to gain a better understanding of the biological functio...
Selim MB, Nóbrega FS, Facó LL, Filippo Hagen SC, De Zoppa ALDV, Arana Chavez VE, Corrêa L. The main purpose of this study was to evaluate the characteristics of a vegetal polymeric biomaterial intended for bone substitution in horses and to investigate the responses of the equine third metacarpal bone to biomaterial implantation. Methods: Six horses were submitted to osteotomy on the dorsal aspect of the left and right third metacarpal bones; one bone defect was randomly selected for treatment with biopolymer, while the other was left untreated and served as a control. Bone density was monitored radiographically after surgery and bone biopsy fragments were collected at the end...
You Y, Uboh CE, Soma LR, Guan F, Li X, Rudy JA, Chen J.A rapid and sensitive method was developed for the screening, quantification and confirmation of ethyl glucuronide (EG) and ethyl sulfate (ES) as biomarkers for alcohol administration to racehorses using liquid chromatography coupled on-line with triple quadrupole tandem mass spectrometry. Urine sample aliquots (0.1 mL) were pre-treated by protein precipitation. Separation of EG and ES was achieved on an Ultra PFP column. Isocratic elution with a flush step was performed using 0.1% formic acid in water (A) and 0.1% formic acid in acetonitrile (B). Analysis was performed by negative electrospra...
Berg LC, Mata X, Thomsen PD.Cartilage-derived retinoic acid sensitive protein (CD-RAP) also known as melanoma inhibitory activity (MIA) has already been established as a marker for chondrocyte differentiation and a number of cancerous conditions in humans. Studies have also shown that CD-RAP/MIA is a potential marker of joint disease. The objective of this study was to characterize the equine CD-RAP/MIA gene and thus make it available as a marker in cartilage research and clinical studies. Gene analysis revealed that the equine gene (GenBank accession no. EF679787) consists of four exons and three introns, and the homolo...
Van Der Vekens N, van Dievoet MA, De Puydt H, Decloedt A, Ven S, De Clercq D, Deprez P, van Loon G.Although cardiac troponin T (cTnT) assays have been used to detect myocardial damage in horses, a cTnT assay has not been analytically validated, to our knowledge. The aims of this study were to estimate the precision of a high-sensitivity cTnT assay in horses and determine the effect of hemolysis on the measured cTnT concentration. Serum samples from horses were mixed in 3 different pools. Pool 1 consisted of samples from 3 healthy horses, pool 2 from 6 horses with heart failure or atypical myopathy, and pool 3 from 10 horses with atypical myopathy. The within- and between-run coefficients of...
Linn-Peirano SC, Hepworth-Warren K, Kinsella H, Diaz-Campos D, Brenseke BM, Cianciolo RE, Schroeder E, Schreeg ME.Equine ingesta-associated choledocholithiasis is a rare cause of morbidity and mortality. We describe here the clinical, gross, histologic, and microbiologic features of this condition in 2 horses and compare the features to 2 previous cases. Case 1 was a 4-y-old Thoroughbred mare with colic. Case 2 was an 18-y-old American Paint Horse mare with colic, chronic weight loss, and inappropriate mentation. Both had elevated biochemical markers of hepatocellular injury and cholestasis and were euthanized given a poor prognosis. Case 1 had a well-formed 5-cm choledocholith surrounding a piece of hay,...
Hussein H, Ishihara A, Menendez M, Bertone A.Plasma pharmacokinetic (PK) and bone resorption biomarker [carboxy-terminal cross-linking telopeptide of type I collagen (CTX-1)] analyses were performed following single and multiple oral dose protocols of a Cathepsin K inhibitor (VEL-0230) in horses. Outcomes included plasma and urine drug and CTX-1 concentrations. In the dose range study, 2, 4, and 8 mg/kg body weight (b.w.) doses were administered in a Latin square design to three mares and evaluated for 1 week. Based on the PK characteristics of VEL-0230, 4 mg/kg b.w. was selected for the dose interval study in which 3.25 days (d) and 7 d...
Vervuert I, Winkelsett S, Christmann L, Bruns E, Hoppen HO, Distl O, Hertsch B, Coenen M.To determine whether plasma concentrations of bone turnover markers in growing Hanoverian foals are influenced by age, housing conditions, or osteochondrosis. Methods: 165 healthy foals and 119 foals with osteochondrosis. Methods: Foals were allocated according to birth date and housing management into groups of early-born (born before March 31, 2001; n = 154 foals, 88 of which were healthy and 66 of which had osteochondrosis) and late-born (born after March 31, 2001; 130 foals, 77 of which were healthy and 53 of which had osteochondrosis) foals. Plasma osteocalcin and carboxyterminal propepti...
Müller AC, Büttner K, Röcken M.In postoperative monitoring of synovial structure infection due to limb wounds, early recognition of a recurrence of synovial infection is indispensable to prevent further damage to the affected synovial structure. This study evaluated the role of serum amyloid A (SAA) as a systemic biomarker in disease monitoring and correlated this tool with clinical variables. In this prospective cohort study, 55 horses with acute limb wounds were divided into two groups: those with (group 1, n = 26) or without (group 2, n = 29) a diagnosis of synovial structure penetration. SAA, lameness and body tempe...
Fradette ME, Céleste C, Richard H, Beauchamp G, Laverty S.To evaluate the effects of continuous oral administration of phenylbutazone on serum and synovial fluid biomarkers of skeletal matrix metabolism in horses. Methods: 11 adult female horses without clinical or radiographic evidence of joint disease. Methods: Horses were randomly assigned to control or treatment groups. Phenylbutazone was administered orally twice daily at a dose of 4.4 mg/kg for 3 days to the treatment group and subsequently at a dose of 2.2 mg/kg for 7 days. Serum and radiocarpal synovial fluid samples were obtained at baseline and thereafter at regular intervals for 4 weeks. B...
Herman EH, Knapton A, Liu Y, Lipshultz SE, Estis J, Todd J, Woodward RA, Cochran T, Zhang J, Poirier MC.Cardiac troponins serve as serum biomarkers of myocardial injury. The current study examined the influence of age on serum concentrations of cardiac troponin I (cTnI). An ultrasensitive immunoassay was used to monitor cTnI concentrations in Sprague-Dawley (SD) rats and Erythrocebus patas monkeys of different ages. The mean cTnI concentrations were highest in 10-day-old rats compared to 25-, 40-, and 80-day-old SD rats. Cardiomyocyte remodeling was apparent in hearts from 10-day-old SD rats as evident by hypercellularity, irregularly shaped nuclei, and moderate numbers of myocytes undergoing mi...
Ireland J, McGowan C.Reference intervals (RIs) and clinical decision limits (CDLs) are frequently established to facilitate interpretation of values of endocrine biomarkers in the diagnosis of disease. Despite their commonplace use in clinical decision-making, these concepts can be confused. Comparing a test result with a RI provides an estimation as to whether or not the individual is healthy, whereas comparison with a CDL facilitates identification of individuals with a particular disease state or at greater risk of adverse clinical outcomes. In practice, there will also be a range of results for which the discr...
Kearney CM, Korthagen NM, Plomp SGM, Labberté MC, de Grauw JC, van Weeren PR, Brama PAJ.This study investigates repeated low-dose lipopolysaccharide (LPS) injections in equine joints as a model for recurrent joint inflammation and its impact on animal welfare. Joint inflammation was induced in eight horses by injecting 0.25 ng of LPS three times at two-week intervals. Welfare scores and clinical parameters were recorded at baseline and over 168 h post-injection. Serial synoviocentesis was performed for the analysis of a panel of synovial fluid biomarkers of inflammation and cartilage turnover. Clinical parameters and a final synoviocentesis were also performed eight weeks after t...
Viljanto M, Gray B, Scarth J.Detection of doping with steroids that are also endogenous in the horse can be challenging, and a variety of approaches to distinguish exogenous administration from their natural presence are employed. Knowledge of endogenous concentrations of various steroids in different genders of horses (intact male, castrated male and female) and factors that could naturally affect them is beneficial for establishing ways for detection of their use. The current internationally adopted approaches include concentration-based thresholds in urine and plasma, steroid ratios in urine and targeting the administe...
Vigolo V, Gautier C, Ertl R, Aurich C, Falomo ME.Subfertility is one of the main issues in horse breeding and the study of mRNAs in sperm might help in elucidating the reasons that lead to this diagnosis. The present study aims at assessing the differences in the expression of 10 potential candidate genes in stallions of different fertility. Frozen-thawed semen of 29 stallions was included. Each sample was classified into two groups according to pregnancy rates (PR) achieved with this semen: "good fertility" (GF; n = 17; PR ≥ 30 %) or "poor fertility" (PF; n = 12; PR <20 %). All stallions underwent a breeding soundness examination ...
Zhang X, Mai Z, Gao Y, Zhao X, Zhang Y.Endometritis is a common condition in mares that causes significant economic loss. Lacking obvious clinical signs, the clinical diagnosis of endometritis in mares relies on case-by-case clinical examinations, which can be particularly inefficient in large-scale farms. Therefore, the identification of potential biomarkers can serve as a non-invasive and efficient screening technique for endometritis in mares. Objective: To compare the blood proteome between fertile mares and mares with endometritis to identify biomarkers potentially associated with the development of endometritis and validate t...
French KM, Musiał AD, Karczewski M, Daugnora L, Shiroukhov R, Ropka-Molik K, Baranowski T, Bertašius M, Skvortsov K, Szymański P....Horse sacrifice and deposition are enigmatic features of funerary rituals identified across prehistoric Europe that persisted in the eastern Baltic. Genetic and isotopic analysis of horses in Balt cemeteries [1st to 13th centuries CE (Common Era)] dismantle prevailing narratives that locally procured stallions were exclusively selected. Strontium isotope analysis provides direct evidence for long-distance (~300 to 1500 kilometers) maritime transport of Fennoscandian horses to the eastern Baltic in the Late Viking Age (11th to 13th centuries CE). Genetic analysis proves that horses of both sexe...
Bazzano M, Marchegiani A, La Gualana F, Petriti B, Spaterna A, Laus F.Horse welfare is the product of multiple factors, including behavioral and physiological adjustments to cope with stressful situation regarding environment and housing condition. Collectively, it is supposed that a horse kept in the wild has a lower level of stress than other housing system, and the aim of the present study was to investigate the level of stress in domestic horses reared in the wild and then moved to human controlled housing, through saliva analysis. Twelve clinically healthy Catria (Italian local breed) mares, usually reared in the wild, were moved into collective paddocks fo...
Laus F, Bazzano M, Spaterna A, Laghi L, Marchegiani A.Metabolomics can allow for the comprehensive identification of metabolites within biological systems, at given time points, in physiological and pathological conditions. In the last few years, metabolomic analysis has gained popularity both in human and in veterinary medicine, showing great potential for novel applications in clinical activity. The aim of applying metabolomics in clinical practice is understanding the mechanisms underlying pathological conditions and the influence of certain stimuli (i.e., drugs, nutrition, exercise) on body systems, in the attempt of identifying biomarkers th...
Renaudin C, Wensley F, Morgan J, Cassano J, Spriet M.Fetal age in Quarter Horses can be predicted within 2 weeks from 100- to 200- days of gestation using femur length, biparietal diameter (cranium diameter) and eye approximated volume. However, as pregnancy advances, the femur and cranium become too large to be imaged in their entirety using ultrasound and the corresponding biometric parameters can no longer be measured. In this longitudinal study, the proximal phalanx (P1) was evaluated as a novel biometric parameter for late gestation to predict fetal age and bone maturation. Transrectal ultrasound was performed in ten pregnant mares with kno...
Ing NH, Konganti K, Ghaffar N, Johnson CD, Forrest DW, Love CC, Varner DD.Males of some species, from horses to humans, require medical help for subfertility problems. There is an urgent need for novel molecular assays that reflect spermatozoal function. In the last 25 years, studies examined RNAs in spermatozoa as a window into gene expression during their development and, more recently, for their functions in early embryo development. In clinics, more dense spermatozoa are isolated by density gradient centrifugation before use in artificial insemination to increase pregnancy rates. The objectives of the current study were to discover and quantify the microRNAs i...
Babasyan S, Rollins A, Wagner B.Interleukin-1β (IL-1β) is one of the key mediators of inflammation during innate immune responses. Mature bioactive IL-1β mediates essential host defense mechanisms but also has a mechanistic role in several autoinflammatory and degenerative diseases. In horses, specific and sensitive assays for IL-1β are crucial for immunological research on inflammatory processes and diseases. In this article, we describe the development of four monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) against equine IL-1β. The specificity of the new IL-1β mAbs was confirmed using a panel of equine recombinant cytokines and chemok...
Jebbawi F, Chemnitzer A, Dietrich M, Pantelyushin S, Lam J, Rhiner T, Keller G, Waldern N, Canonica F, Fettelschoss-Gabriel A.Insect bite hypersensitivity (IBH) is the most frequent skin allergy of horses and is highly debilitating, especially in the chronic phase. IBH is caused by IgE-mediated hypersensitivity reactions to culicoides midge bites and an imbalanced immune response that reduces the welfare of affected horses. Unassigned: In the present study, we investigated the pathological mechanisms of IBH, aiming to understand the immune cell modulation in acute allergic skin lesions of IBH horses with the goal of finding possible biomarkers for a diagnostic approach to monitor treatment success. Unassigned: By qPC...
Feijo LS, Wolfsdorf KE, Canisso IF, Parry S, Felippe MJB.Placental infection is an important cause of late-term pregnancy loss and neonatal diseases in horses. Detection of changes in blood parameters especially during early placentitis could improve the diagnostic accuracy, treatment decision, and potential outcomes. The objectives of this 2-part study were to identify differences in circulating immunological, inflammatory, and hormonal parameters between mares with natural ascending placentitis and control mares; evaluate each and combination of parameters as predictors of placentitis; and determine how these parameters indicate severity of placen...
Leite RO, Albertino LG, Sperandio LMS, Campos F, Campos R, Borges AS, Oliveira-Filho JP.Exercise-induced pulmonary haemorrhage (EIPH) in athletic horses is characterized by the presence of blood from the lungs in the tracheobronchial tree after intense exercise. Despite the high prevalence of EIPH in horses, the primary aetiology remains unknown. Variants in the genes encoding CD39 and CD39L1 (ENTPD1 and ENTPD2, respectively) were previously reported as potential genetic causes involved in EIPH pathogenesis. However, the role of these variants in haemostatic functions is unknown. Results: To investigate the association between EIPH and missense variants in the ENTPD1 (rs115229627...
Bertuglia A, Pallante M, Pagliara E, Valle D, Bergamini L, Bollo E, Bullone M, Riccio B.Tarsocrural osteochondrosis (OCD) is a developmental orthopedic disease commonly affecting young Standardbreds, with different fragment localization and size. Clinically, it is characterized by variable synovial effusion in the absence of lameness, whose determinants are ill-defined. We hypothesized that localization and physical characteristics of the osteochondral fragments like dimensions, multifragmentation, and instability influence joint effusion and correlate with synovial markers of cartilage degradation and inflammation. Clinical data, synovial fluid and intact osteochondral fragments...
Cocco R, Sechi S, Rizzo M, Arrigo F, Giannetto C, Piccione G, Arfuso F.Due to the paucity of information on circus management effects on the welfare of horses, this study investigated the plasma concentrations of noradrenaline, dopamine and serotonin, known to be indices of mental status, as well as the reactive oxygen metabolites (d-Roms) and the biological antioxidant potential (BAP), likely to denote the oxidant/antioxidant equilibrium of organisms, in horses managed in different Italian circuses. For the study, 56 circus horses of different breeds and ages were enrolled and divided into six groups according to the horses' management (circus management, groups...
Ungri AM, Dos Santos Sabatke BF, Rossi IV, das Neves GB, Marques J, Ribeiro BG, Borges GK, Moreira RS, Ramírez MI, Miletti LC.Trypanosoma evansi is a unicellular protozoan responsible for causing a disease known as "surra," which is found in different regions of the world and primarily affects horses and camels. Few information is known about virulence factors released from the parasite within the animals. The organism can secrete extracellular vesicles (EVs), which transport a variety of molecules, including proteins. Before being considered exclusively as a means for eliminating unwanted substances, extracellular vesicles (EVs) have emerged as key players in intercellular communication, facilitating interactions be...
Bayless RL, Cooper BL, Sheats MK.Colic is a common and potentially life-threatening condition in horses; in many cases, it remains challenging for clinicians to determine the cause, appropriate treatment, and prognosis. One approach that could improve patient care and outcomes is identification of novel diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers. Plasma cell-free DNA (cfDNA) is a biomarker that shows promise for characterizing disease severity and predicting survival in humans with acute abdominal pain or requiring emergency abdominal surgery. In horses, we recently determined that extracted plasma cfDNA concentrations are elevated...
Navarrete-López P, Asselstine V, Maroto M, Lombó M, Cánovas Á, Gutiérrez-Adán A.RNA molecules within ejaculated sperm can be characterized through whole-transcriptome sequencing, enabling the identification of pivotal transcripts that may influence reproductive success. However, the profiling of sperm transcriptomes through next-generation sequencing has several limitations impairing the identification of functional transcripts. In this study, we explored the nature of the RNA sequences present in the sperm transcriptome of two livestock species, cattle and horses, using RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) technology. Through processing of transcriptomic data derived from bovine and...
Loup B, André F, Leuenberger N, Marchand A, Barnabé A, Delcourt V, Garcia P, Popot MA, Bailly-Chouriberry L.Detection and monitoring of biomarkers related to doping is particularly suitable for the development of analytical strategies dedicated to indirect detection of banned substances. Previous studies in horses have already allowed the investigation of transcriptomic biomarkers in equine blood associated with reGH and rHuEPO administrations. Our most recent developments continue to focus on the discovery and monitoring of transcriptomic biomarkers for the control of ESAs, and a collaborative study with WADA-accredited doping control laboratories has recently been initiated to conduct a pilot stud...
