Immunity to rotavirus in conventional neonatal calves

The local and systemic humoral immune responses to rotavirus were studied in six conventional neonatal calves. Attenuated bovine rotavirus was administered either orally or directly into an isolated intestinal loop. The parameters monitored were neutralizing rotavirus antibody in serum, immunofluorescent and neutralizing rotavirus antibody in intestinal loop washings, and rotavirus antibody-producing cells in intestinal mucosa. An antibody response was observed in the serum and intestinal secretions from one calf only. Viral replication was not detected in the isolated intestinal loop. Rotavirus antibody-producing cells were found in the intestinal mucosa of five calves. Double staining revealed that most of these cells produced antibody of the immunoglobulin A class. The conclusions were: (i) a previously described system to detect rotavirus antibody-producing cells can be used to study immune responses in neonatal calves, (ii) the class or subclass of antibody in rotavirus antibody-producing cells can be determined by double immunofluorescent staining, (iii) neonatal calves respond to rotavirus inoculation with a local immunoglobulin A response, and (iv) most of the rotavirus antibody-producing cells are located in the mucosa of the proximal small intestine.