Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2025 Feb;15(2):724-730.
doi: 10.5455/OVJ.2025.v15.i2.21. Epub 2025 Feb 28.

Neospora caninum in goats from Iraq: A serological and molecular study

Roqaya B Mohammed  1 , Mansour J Ali  1
Affiliations
Review

Neospora caninum in goats from Iraq: A serological and molecular study

Roqaya B Mohammed et al. Open Vet J. 2025 Feb.

Abstract

Background: Neospora caninum is an Apicomplexa parasite that is an important abortive infectious agent in cattle, goats, and other domestic and wild animals.

Aim: This study aimed to identify N. caninum using Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in suspected goats in Al-Diwaniyah Province, Iraq.

Methods: This study was conducted to identify N. caninum in blood and milk samples of 138 goats (92 blood and 46 milk samples) from suspected infected goats in Al-Diwaniyah Province, Iraq. Two techniques were used; ELISA and PCR (NC5-gene-based and partial sequencing), and the recorded data were categorized into age, sex, and region. Results: ELISA results revealed that the seroprevalence rates were 14.13% (13/92) in blood and 21.73% (10/46) in milk samples. The PCR results demonstrated that for the blood samples, 3/45 (6.66%) and 2/47 (4.25%) were positive for males and females, respectively. The PCR milk findings showed that the highest rates were 3/20 (15%) and 1/26 (3.84%) in the 2-4 and 4-6 age groups, respectively. Sequencing demonstrated close identities of the examined isolates to those from New Zealand and Australia for the blood and milk samples.

Conclusions: The findings of this study reveal that N. caninum is widely distributed in goats, which could be an important source of zoonosis in the tested areas. The phylogenetic analysis shows a shared ancestor between the study isolates and those from New Zealand and Australia.

Keywords: Goat; Iraq; Molecular biology; Neosporosis; Serology.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest related to the publication of this work. HighlightsThe study investigated a clinical examination and identified specific antibodies in milk and Blood to diagnose caprine neoporosis.The clinical examination was compared to the ELISA results.NC5 gene-based PCR and partial sequencing produced highly accurate results that can be used for the confirmation of neosporosis.

Figures

Fig. 1.
Fig. 1.. Prevalence of neosporosis (using ELISA and polymerase chain reaction) According to (A) sex; (B) region; (C) age. The samples were tested, and the results were recorded, grouped, and analyzed using SPSS software. The statistical analysis was performed using the chi-square test, and the results were considered significant when ***p < 0.001, ****p < 0.0001.
Fig. 2.
Fig. 2.. Agarose gel electrophoresis of NC5 gene for Neospora caninum from milk and blood samples of goats.
Fig. 3.
Fig. 3.. Phylogenetic analysis of Neospora caninum isolates based on the NC5 gene from blood and milk samples of goats. This tree was developed for the evolution of N. caninum isolates from Iraqi goat blood and milk. The NC5 gene sequences were aligned multiple times using ClustalW in MEGA 11, and the trees were built using the maximum likelihood algorithm. The fit used a nucleotide substitution model, and bootstrap testing with 1,000 replicates was performed to verify the branching patterns. Its tree exhibited similar clustering of Iraqi isolates and New Zealand and Australia isolates.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

References

    1. Al-Ubaidy Yathrib, Amjed Alsultan. Using of Integrons as Biomarker to Assess Dissemination and Diversity of Antimicrobial Resistance Genes in Farm Animal Manure. Journal of Pure and Applied Microbiology 17, no. 2023;3:1708–1714.
    1. Al-Qassab S.E., Reichel M.P., Ellis J.T. On the biological and genetic diversity in Neospora caninum. Diversity. 2010;2(3):411–438.
    1. Al-Saadi M., Al-Sallami D., Alsultan A. Molecular identification of Anaplasma platys in cattle by nested PCR. Iranian Journal of Microbiology. 2023;15(3):433. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Al-Shabany A.C., Alkhaled M.J. Nc-5 gene-dependent molecular identification and phylogenetic investigation of Neospora caninum in sheep. Iraqi J. Vet. Sci. 2024;38(2):443–447.
    1. Baldini M.H.M., Sandoval E.D.P., Duarte J.M.B. Assessment of transplacental transmission of Neospora caninum and Toxoplasma gondii in Neotropical deer. An estimative based on serology. Vet. Parasitol. 2022;303:109677. - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources