A Novel Real-Time PCR-Based Screening Test with Pooled Fecal Samples for Bovine Johne's Disease

Johne's disease (JD) is an economically important infectious disease in livestock farming caused by Mycobacterium avium subsp. paratuberculosis. As an alternative to serological tests, which are used mainly for the screening of whole herds, we developed a novel ResoLight-based real-time PCR (RL-PCR) assay with pooled fecal samples for the detection of fecal shedders in cattle herds. The RL-PCR assay included an internal amplification control (IC) which was amplified using the same primer pair as the target molecule M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis IS900 and differentiated based on melting temperatures. Individual fecal suspensions were pooled and concentrated by centrifugation to avoid a loss of sensitivity by the dilution effect. Combined with a DNA extraction kit (Johne-PureSpin; FASMAC), no inhibition of PCR amplification was observed with up to 15 fecal samples in a pool. The detection limit of RL-PCR at a pool size of 10 was 10 M. avium subsp. paratuberculosis organisms per gram of feces, which was comparable to that of individual testing. A total of 2,654 animals in 12 infected herds were screened by individual antibody-enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and the RL-PCR assay using pooled feces. Fifty animals were diagnosed with JD through the screening by RL-PCR, compared with only 5 by ELISA (which were also positive in RL-PCR). In 7 JD-free herds, the results of 4 out of 327 pools (1.2%) were invalid due to the lack of IC amplification, and then animals were confirmed negative individually. Our results suggest that implementation of herd screening by pooled RL-PCR would advance the monitoring and control of JD in cattle herds.