Coriolus versicolor (C. versicolor) is a higher fungi or mushroom which is now known by its accepted scientific names as Trametes versicolor (L.) Lloyd. Many studies have shown that β-glucans from C. versicolor have various physiological activities, including activating macrophages to protect against Salmonella infection. However, whether β-glucans have antiviral effects has not been reported. Hence, the objective of this study was to confirm whether β-glucans could boost the immune response to combat influenza virus in mouse and chick models. The results show that β-glucans induced the expression of Dectin-1, costimulatory molecules (CD80/86) and cytokines IL-6, IL-1β, IFN-β and IL-10 in murine bone marrow dendritic cells (BMDCs). In addition, orally administered β-glucans reduced weight loss, mortality and viral titers in the lungs of mice infected with influenza virus and attenuated pathological lung damage caused by the virus in the mice. Orally administered β-glucans improved survival and reduced lung viral titers in chickens infected with H9N2 avian influenza virus. These results suggest that β-glucans have a significant antiviral effect. Therefore, β-glucans could become a potential immunomodulator against influenza virus.

Salmonella is one of the most important zoonotic pathogens that can cause both acute and chronic illnesses in poultry flocks, and can also be transmitted to humans from infected poultry. The purpose of this study was to investigate the prevalence, antimicrobial resistance, and molecular characteristics of Salmonella isolated from diseased and clinically healthy chickens in Anhui, China. In total, 108 Salmonella isolates (5.66%) were successfully recovered from chicken samples (n = 1908), including pathological tissue (57/408, 13.97%) and cloacal swabs (51/1500, 3.40%), and S. Enteritidis (43.52%), S. Typhimurium (23.15%), and S. Pullorum (10.19%) were the three most prevalent isolates. Salmonella isolates showed high rates of resistance to penicillin (61.11%), tetracyclines (47.22% to tetracycline and 45.37% to doxycycline), and sulfonamides (48.89%), and all isolates were susceptible to imipenem and polymyxin B. In total, 43.52% isolates were multidrug-resistant and had complex antimicrobial resistance patterns. The majority of isolates harbored cat1 (77.78%), blaTEM (61.11%), and blaCMY-2 (63.89%) genes, and the antimicrobial resistance genes in the isolates were significantly positively correlated with their corresponding resistance phenotype. Salmonella isolates carry high rates of virulence genes, with some of these reaching 100% (invA, mgtC, and stn). Fifty-seven isolates (52.78%) were biofilm-producing. The 108 isolates were classified into 12 sequence types (STs), whereby ST11 (43.51%) was the most prevalent, followed by ST19 (20.37%) and ST92 (13.89%). In conclusion, Salmonella infection in chicken flocks is still serious in Anhui Province, and not only causes disease in chickens but might also pose a threat to public health security.

Background: Pullorum disease caused by Salmonella pullorum is one of the most important infectious diseases in the poultry industry, responsible for causing substantial economic losses globally. On farms, the traditional method to detect S. pullorum infection mainly involves the collection of feces and sera to test for antigens and antibodies, respectively, but the regularity of Salmonella pullorum dissemination in internal organs and shedding patterns and antibody production in infected chickens remains unclear. Herein we aimed to investigate the dissemination of S. pullorum to different organs and bacterial shedding patterns in the faeces as well as serum antibody production post-infection in chickens of different ages. Result: In this study, the liver and heart of 2-day-old chickens showed the highest copy numbers of S. pullorum at 6.4 × 10⁶ and 1.9 × 10⁶ copies of DNA target sequences/30 mg, respectively. In case of 10-day-old chickens, the percentage of S. pullorum fecal shedding (0%–40%) and antibody production (0%–56.6%) markedly fluctuated during the entire experiment; furthermore, in case of 42-week-old chickens, the percentage of birds showing S. pullorum shedding in the faeces showed a downward trend (from 63.33% to 6.6% in the oral inoculation group and from 43.3% to 10% in the intraperitoneal injection group), while that of birds showing serum antibody production remained at a high level (38.3% and 80% in the oral inoculation and intraperitoneal injection groups, respectively). We also performed cohabitation experiments, showed that 15% 10-day-old and 3.33% 42-week-old chickens were infected via the horizontal transmission in cohabitation with S. pullorum infected chickens, and revealed a high risk of horizontal transmission of S. pullorum. Conclusion: This study systematically evaluated the dissemination of S. pullorum in internal organs and bacterial fecal shedding patterns, and antibody production in infected chickens. Collectively, our findings indicate how to effectively screen S. pullorum-negative chickens on livestock farms and should also help in the development of measures to control and eradicate S. pullorum.