Figure 7

Evaluation of anti- Eimeria activity in vivo of fodder containing antibody-expressing pea seed flour or shred. (a) Analysis of activity in vivo of orally applied antibody-containing pea seed flour (force-feeding). The animals were infected with manually prepared individual doses of 20 ± 1 oocysts. Two evaluation groups (n = 11) were treated with the material containing anti-Eimeria scFv AB28, one group received pea flour from seeds expressing AB28 and the other group was treated with the antibody fragment isolated from the tobacco leaves. As positive controls of infection, two animal groups (11 birds in each) were treated with the same quantities of material comprising the irrelevant BA11 antibody, either in form of pea flour or as soluble antibody isolated from the tobacco leaves. The negative control group comprised five birds to who heat inactivated oocysts were given. The oocyst counts were determined in individual feces and each sample was counted six times by two different persons. The infection outcomes were assessed by quantifying the amount of Eimeria oocysts in feces of infected chickens at days 7 and 8 p.i. (days of maximal oocyst release). (b) High infection dose model (ad libitum feeding). Three treatment cohorts were evaluated: group 1 (n = 30) received fodder with 10% AB28-pea shred; group 2 (n = 25), positive control for infection (infected, not treated); group 3 (n = 5), negative control of infection (non-infected, not treated). The birds in groups 2 and 3 were fed with the fodder containing 10% wt pea. Infection outcomes were assessed by quantifying the amounts of the Eimeria oocysts in caeca of infected chickens at day 7 p.i. (c) Low infection dose model (ad libitum feeding). Infection outcomes were assessed by quantifying the amounts of the Eimeria oocysts in caeca of infected chickens at day 7 p.i. Due to the relatively low infection rate, only the oocyst shedding animals were considered, i.e. 17 birds from the group 1 (AB28) and 13 animals from the group 2.