Dr. Murai Éva szerk.: Parasitologia Hungarica 23. (Budapest, 1990)

Parasit, hung. 23. 1990 The pathogenicity of Trypanosoma equiperdum to different rodents. III. Susceptibility of the guinea pig (Cavia porcellus)* Dr. Györgyi HORVÁTH

1

, Dr. Mihály ALBERT

2 and Dr. Ferenc KEMENES

3 Department of Parasitology and Zoology

1 and Department of Pathological Anatomy

2

, University of Veterinary Science and PHYLAXIA

3 Veterinary Biologicals Co. Budapest, Hungary "The pathogenicity of Trypanosoma equiperdum to different r

odents.III. Sus

ceptibility of the guinea pig (Cavia porcellus)". - Horváth, Gy., Albert, M. and

|Kemenes, F.| - Parasit, hung., 23: 19-26. 1990. ABSTRACT. A total of 30 mature guinea pigs were inoculated intraperitoneally with 1-1.5 x 10 Trypanosoma equiperdum. The trypanosomes were demonstrable from the guinea pigs only for 3 weeks; after that time the possibility of individual detection decreased. At postinoculation (PI) weeks 5-6 three guinea pigs died of subacute, and at PI weeks 20-22 another three guinea pigs died of chronic trypanosomosis. The disease seen in these latter 3 animals corresponded to the pathological entity of dourine. These studies suggest that the guinea pig is moderately resistant to T. equiperdum and is a suitable model for the experimental reproduction of chronic dourine. KEY WORDS: Trypanosoma equiperdum, guinea pig, moderate susceptibility, characteristic lesions of dourine. Although the guinea pig (Cavia porcellus) is not a natural host of Trypanosoma equiperdum (Doflein, 1901)., it is relatively easy to infect it with the parasite, similarly to other laboratory rodents. The majority of trypanosomes belonging to the brucei group can be adapted to a wide variety of mammalian species without using immunosuppression (DESOWITZ 1963). The guinea pig is suitable for maintaining T. equiperdum for a certain time, contrarily to mice and rats which die of acute septicemia within days after infection (KEMENES and HORVÁTH 1986). According to earlier observations, trypanosomes can be demonstrated from guinea pigs for about one month, while mice and rats inoculated with infected blood from guinea pigs die in 2-7 days depending on the dose. Earlier in the European serological laboratories the trypanosomes used for diagnostic tests were often maintained in guinea pigs. With blood from the guinea pigs rats were inoculated at one-month intervals. The trypanosomes were separated from the blood of agonizing individuals by centrifugation and used as antigen for the diagnosis of dourine in horses (VIZY 1947). The complement fixation test suitable for the laboratory diagnosis of dourine was described in detail by a Canadian researcher, WATSON (1915) who maintained the trypanosomes in rats and used guinea pigs only for the production of complement. The complement fixation test is considered the • Paper based on a poster presented at the 13th WAAVP Conference, 7-11 August 1989, Berlin, Germany.