title: In vivo detection of scrapie cases from blood by infrared spectroscopy.
abstract: In the present study, infrared spectroscopy was shown to be able to distinguish healthy and scrapie-infected animals by analysis of the white-cell membranous fraction from blood. Infrared spectroscopy was able to detect not only clinical cases, but also animals at a preclinical stage of the disease. These findings suggest this technique as an accurate in vivo diagnostic tool that could be applied to animal as well as human samples. In addition to possibly avoiding the slaughter of a huge number of animals with the socio-economic consequences that this poses, the test could be expected to become useful in the prevention of human transmission by blood transfusion.
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Estructura de la Materia (CSIC), Serrano 121, 28006 Madrid, Spain.
authors.forename: Pedro
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Carmona
authors.affiliation: Centro Nacional de Referencia de EET (University of Zaragoza), Miguel Servet 177, 50013 Zaragoza, Spain.
authors.forename: Marta
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Monzón
authors.affiliation: Centro Nacional de Referencia de EET (University of Zaragoza), Miguel Servet 177, 50013 Zaragoza, Spain.
authors.forename: Eva
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Monleón
authors.affiliation: Centro Nacional de Referencia de EET (University of Zaragoza), Miguel Servet 177, 50013 Zaragoza, Spain.
authors.forename: Juan José
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Badiola
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Neurobiología Santiago Ramón y Cajal (CSIC), Doctor Arce 37, 28006 Madrid, Spain.
authors.forename: Jaime
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Monreal
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002462:Cell Membrane / Q000737:chemistry; D007962:Leukocytes / Q000737:chemistry; D012608:Scrapie / Q000097:blood* / Q000175:diagnosis*; D012756:Sheep; D017550:Spectroscopy, Fourier Transform Infrared