Apoptosis and cell proliferation in the mouse model of embryonic death induced by Tritrichomonas foetus infection

WOUDWYK M. A; ZANUZZI C. N; NISHIDA F; GIMENO E. J; SOTO P.; MONTEAVARO C. E; BARBEITO C. G.

EXPERIMENTAL PARASITOLOGY

ACADEMIC PRESS INC ELSEVIER SCIENCE

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2015 vol. 156 p. 32 - 36

0014-4894

Bovine tritrichomonosis is a sexually transmitted disease caused by the protozoon Tritrichomonas foetusand characterised by embryonic-death and abortion. During pregnancy, the processes of cell proliferationand death play a crucial role for blastocyst implantation and the subsequent maintenance of earlypregnancy, and their misbalance may lead to the abortion. In this study, we aimed to investigate whethercell proliferation and death may be altered during tritrichomonosis. For this purpose, we used pregnantBALB/c mice as an alternative experimental animal model that has successfully reproduced the infection.We analysed the immunohistochemical expression of active caspase-3 and proliferating cell nuclear(PCNA) antigens in the endometrium of infected mice.We found an increase in the number of caspase-3positive cells in infected mice that were not pregnant at the necropsy. Besides, the number of positiveproliferating cells increased in the uterine luminal epithelium of infected animals killed at 5?7 days post