Marcela Suárez-Esquivel

National University of Costa Rica | UNA · Escuela de Medicina Veterinaria (EMV)

ASGARD+ (Accelerated Sequential Genome-analysis and Antibiotic Resistance Detection) is a command-line platform for automatic identification of antibiotic-resistance genes in bacterial genomes, providing an easy-to-use interface to process big batches of sequence files from whole genome sequencing, with minimal configuration. It also provides a CPU...

Age parameters in cetaceans allow examining conservation and studying individuals with growth affection. The age and sexual maturity of 51 stranded Stenella coeruleoalba striped dolphins from the Eastern Tropical Pacific (ETP) of Costa Rica, most suffering brucellosis (95.6%), were assessed. In order to ascertain the dolphins’ ages, we measured the...

Brucella abortus is a facultative intracellular pathogen causing a severe zoonotic disease worldwide. The two-component regulatory system (TCS) BvrR/BvrS of B. abortus is conserved in members of the Alphaproteobacteria class. It is related to the expression of genes required for host interaction and intracellular survival. Here we report that bvrR...

The Eastern Pacific green turtle (EPGT) has been differentiating from the green turtle and is currently considered a separate population. This study determined the values of reproductive hormones and total thyroxine of 56 resident foraging green turtles captured between 2012 and 2014 at Golfo Dulce, Costa Rica. All of them underwent a physical exam...

Cetacean neurobrucellosis is a common cause of strandings in Costa Rica diagnosed by serology, bacteriology, and histopathology. Pathological studies were performed on 18 dolphins. Twelve were scanned by postmortem computed tomography (PMCT) as a complementary tool for describing neurobrucellosis and osteoarticular alterations associated with Bruce...

The Eastern Pacific green turtle (EPGT) has been differentiating from the green turtle and is currently being considered a separate population. In this study, values for hematology and biochemistry of 85 green turtles captured from 2010 to 2014 were analyzed. These animals correspond to a resident foraging population at Golfo Dulce, Costa Rica. All...

A dwarf sperm whale Kogia sima stranded alive along the Central Pacific Coast of Costa Rica. The whale, handled by tourists and local inhabitants, was weak, had buoyancy difficulties, and eventually aborted and died, showing severe necrotizing placentitis and other pathological signs. Both the mother and the fetus had antibodies against Brucella li...

Brucellosis is a prevalent disease in Costa Rica (CR), with an increasing number of human infections. Close to half of homes in CR have one or more dogs, corresponding to ∼1.4 million canines, most of them in the Central Valley within or near the cities of San José, Heredia, and Alajuela. From 302 dog sera collected from this region, 19 were positi...

Brucella organisms are responsible for one of the most widespread bacterial zoonoses, named brucellosis. The disease affects several species of animals, including humans. One of the most intriguing aspects of the brucellae is that the various species show a~97% similarity at the genome level. Still, the distinct Brucella species display different h...

Brucellosis, caused by Brucella abortus, is a major disease of cattle and humans worldwide distributed. Eradication and control of the disease has been difficult in Central and South America, Central Asia, the Mediterranean and the Middle East. Epidemiological strategies combined with phylogenetic methods provide the high-resolution power needed to...

Brucellosis in rams is caused by Brucella ovis or Brucella melitensis and it is considered one of the most important infectious diseases of males in sheep-raising countries. Molecular characterization of Brucella spp. achieved by multi-locus variable number of tandem repeats analysis (MLVA) is a powerful tool to genotype Brucella spp. However, data...

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.3389/fvets.2019.00175.].

Members of the genus Brucella cluster in two phylogenetic groups: classical and non-classical species. The former group is composed of Brucella species that cause disease in mammals, including humans. A Brucella species, labeled as Brucella sp. BCCN84.3, was isolated from the testes of a Saint Bernard dog suffering orchiepididymitis, in Costa Rica....

La manipulación de animales silvestres, tanto de vida libre como en cautiverio, induce estrés elevadoen los individuos, lo cual resulta en potencial detrimento de su salud y altera los resultados de laspruebas clínicas derivados de muestras obtenidas bajo condiciones estresantes para el animal. Poresto, la tendencia en endocrinología de especies si...

El hipoadrenocorticismo, o enfermedad de Addison, representa un gran desafío diagnóstico por susimilitud con varias patologías, tanto en su presentación clínica como en los hallazgos de laboratorio.Se recibió una perra castrada, French Poodle, con 4 años de edad y 4.8 kg de peso, que presentabavómito, anorexia, depresión y temblores musculares dura...

Los quistes ováricos en perras son una condición poco frecuente, multifactorial y de difícil tratamiento,condición que adquiere relevancia ante el aumento de la popularidad en la reproducción de determinadasrazas con fines comerciales. Una perra American Strafford de 8 años, con historia de haber estadoextraviada durante un mes aproximadamente, ing...

Blood parameters and reproductive hormone profile of female Choloepus hoffmanni in captivity. In wild animal species, the use of non-invasive and non-stressful procedures to determine hormone profiles , such as fecal steroid measurements, has considerably increased the comprehension of their reproductive physiology. Since there is limited informati...

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the correlation between the density of native gastric Helicobacter spp and the presence of gastric lesions in dogs. ANIMALS 80 dogs of various breeds, sexes, and ages. PROCEDURES Gastroscopic and histologic examinations were performed for all dogs. Helicobacter spp were detected by combining evaluation of urease activity and r...

It has been proposed that Helicobacter may play a significant role in the generation of gastritis and cancer in dogs. However, despite several independent efforts, there is still controversy regarding the true ability of Helicobacter to cause gastric lesions in these animals. The foregoing is due in part to the fact that gastritis is a multifactori...

In wild animal species, the use of non-invasive and non-stressful procedures to determine hormone profiles, such as fecal steroid measurements, has considerably increased the comprehension of their reproductive physiology. Since there is limited information related to the reproductive hormone profiles of the two-toed sloth, Choloepus hoffmani, a st...

Intracellular bacterial pathogens probably arose when their ancestor adapted from a free-living environment to an intracellular one, leading to clonal bacteria with smaller genomes and less sources of genetic plasticity. Still, this plasticity is needed to respond to the challenges posed by the host. Members of the Brucella genus are facultative-ex...

Intracellular bacterial pathogens probably arose when their ancestor adapted from a free-living environment to an intracellular one, leading to clonal bacteria with smaller genomes and less sources of genetic plasticity. Still, this plasticity is needed to respond to the challenges posed by the host. Members of the Brucella genus are facultative-ex...

Several species of Brucella are known to be zoonotic, but B. neotomae infection has been thought to be limited to wood rats. In 2008 and 2011, however, B. neotomae was isolated from cerebrospinal fluid of 2 men with neurobrucellosis. The nonzoonotic status of B. neotomae should be reassessed.

Protein mass values of Brucella reference strains and bneohCR2, and general information and accession numbers of the genomes included in the phylogenetic analysis.

Several species of Brucella are known to be zoonotic, but B. neotomae infection has been thought to be limited to wood rats. In 2008 and 2011, however, B. neotomae was isolated from cerebrospinal fluid of 2 men with neurobrucellosis. The nonzoonotic status of B. neotomae should be reassessed.

The hmtp210 gene of Avibacterium paragallinarum, the causative agent of infectious coryza,encodes an outer-membrane hemagglutinin (HA) that plays an essential role in pathogenicity. A hypervariable region within this HA, which is highly antigenic, is proposed as a candidate for recombinant vaccine production. Nonetheless, little is known about its...

Brucellosis is a bacterial infectious disease affecting a wide range of mammals and a neglected zoonosis caused by species of the genetically homogenous genus Brucella. As in most studies on bacterial diseases, research in brucellosis is carried out by using reference strains as canonical models to understand the mechanisms underlying host pathogen...

Fungicidal concentration of amphotericin B for planktonic cells and biofilm madure of Cryptococcus neoformans and Cryptococcus gattii.

Primers used for RT-pPCR analysis for the virulence analysis.

Even though thyroid gland diseases are unusual in horses, it is important to have a reference interval for thyroid hormones in this species at every veterinary endocrine laboratory. In addition, cortisol and thyroid hormone measurement is useful in horses, not only for disease diagnosis, but as a tool for monitoring and researching performance and...

Autoimmune diseases (AID) continue to represent a major diagnostic challenge to veterinary practitioners and can be easily confused with other pathologies. It is the intent of this paper to exemplify this situation using a presumptive case of autoimmune hemolytic anemia, one of the most frequent autoimmune diseases in dogs. This case was referred t...

Hormonal reference intervals vary according the measurement method used and the geochemical environment where populations develop. Consequently, each lab must have its own reference intervals in order to interpret results properly. This paper was aimed at establishing a reference interval for total T4 (TT4), free T4 (FT4), total T3 (TT3) and cortis...

Animal welfare represents a controversial topic that has attracted special interest in recent years, and, consequently, has been brought to the attention of biomedical research. The use of animals has greatly benefited scientific progress in the field of medical research. However, it has been widely questioned because of its ethical implications. U...