Identificación molecular de una cepa de herpesvirus bovino tipo 2 en Venezuela

bovine mamilitis is a viral disease which is caused by bovine herpes virus type 2 (bhv - 2). this disease is difficult to differentiate of food and mouth disease (fmd) because infected cows show vesicles and ulcerating lesions on teats and udder. in order to investigate if bhv-2 is present in venezuelan cattle udder samples of eight cows undergoing clinical symptoms similar to fmd were taken and tested for viral diagnostic. all samples were negative to fmd and vesicular stomatitis, but a viral strain with cytopathic effect typical to bhv-2 was isolated from one of them when a primary cells culture of bovine kidney fetus was inoculated. the presence of bhv-2 was confirmed in venezuela according with the cytopathic effect, the pcr product of 422 bp obtained by specific test and the significant alignments by blast.