Annarita Wirz

Foundation Santa Lucia | FSL · Department of Experimental Neuroscience

Scientists and technicians who work in contact with laboratory animals are exposed to complex biological mixtures from animals, bedding and feed. The main objective of this study was to characterize the exposures to endotoxins and animal allergens in a biomedical research institution located in Central Italy by means of air sampling in the breathin...

The exposure to biocontaminants in animal facilities represents a risk for developing infectious, allergic and toxic diseases. The aim of this study was to determine what factors could be associated with a high level of exposure to biological agents through the measure and characterization of airborne fungi, bacteria, endotoxin, (1,3)-β-d-glucan an...

Background Laboratory Animal Allergy (LAA) has been considered a risk for the workers since 1989 by the NIOSH. About one third of the Laboratory Animal Workers (LAWs) can manifest symptoms to LAA as asthma, rhinitis, conjunctivitis and cutaneous reactions. The prevalence of LAA-induced clinical symptoms has been estimated with a great variability (...

Introduction Researchers and technicians who work with laboratory animals are exposed to animal allergens and endotoxin in the workplace. Inhalation of these bio-contaminants has been identified as a risk factor for respiratory and allergic diseases resulting in impaired lung function and laboratory animal allergy. The objective of this study was t...

Animal welfare depends on the possibility to express species-specific behaviours and can be strongly compromised in socially and environmentally deprived conditions. Nesting materials and refuges are very important resources to express these behaviours and should be considered as housing supplementation items. We evaluated the effects of one item o...

This paper presents the results of a demographic analysis of 22 years of data recorded on a colony of tufted capuchin monkeys (Cebus apella) in captivity at the CNR Primate Centre (Rome, Italy). Information is provided on reproduction, sex ratio, inter-birth interval (IBI), seasonality, and body weight. From 1984 to 2006, 46 live births were record...

Hematological and blood biochemical parameters are of great importance in medical and veterinary practice. Unfortunately, normal reference range intervals for hematological and serum biochemical values in the tufted capuchin monkey (Cebus apella) have seldom been reported. The study reported here is based on data from blood samples collected from 4...

Gastrotrichs are meiobenthic invertebrates of obscure origin and unclear phylogenetic alliances. Uncertainties also plague the intra-group relationship with major contrasts between the evolutionary scenarios inferred from morphology or molecules. In this study we analysed partial sequences of the 18S rDNA gene of 18 taxa (14 new and 4 published) to...

An effective health care program entails the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of medical problems. A knowledge of baseline values in clinically normal individuals is essential for determining the limits between good health and disease and for understanding the changes produced by pathogenic agents. However, very little information is currently a...

Gastrotricha form a phylum which is crucial for defining the origin of pseudocoelomates, in that they share a number of characters with Rotifera and Nematoda but also with acoelomates, and even the evolutionary relationships within the phylum are anything but defined. For this reason the first extensive molecular data on Gastrotricha from the 18S r...

We have characterized a macronuclear gene of the ciliate protozoan Euplotes raikovi, which encodes an acidic ribosomal protein of the P protein family. This gene shows the typical organization of the hypotrich ciliate macronuclear "gene-sized" molecules with Euplotes telomeres at the ends. The longest open reading frame encodes a conceptual protein...