{"id":248765,"date":"2026-08-10T07:15:17","date_gmt":"2026-08-10T11:15:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=248765"},"modified":"2026-08-10T07:49:37","modified_gmt":"2026-08-10T11:49:37","slug":"a-better-test-for-leptospirosis-in-cattle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2026\/08\/a-better-test-for-leptospirosis-in-cattle\/","title":{"rendered":"A Better Test for Leptospirosis in Cattle"},"content":{"rendered":"

Assistant professor Elsio Wunder, DVM, Ph.D., has been awarded a three-year, $570,000 grant to improve diagnostics for bovine leptospirosis, a bacterial disease that can infect cattle and spread to humans.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The award comes from the U.S.-Israel Binational Agricultural Research and Development Fund, or BARD. BARD is a competitive funding program for mutually beneficial, mission-oriented, strategic and applied research of agricultural problems, jointly conducted by American and Israeli scientists. Wunder will be collaborating with UConn assistant research professor Camila Hamond, Ph.D.; Northern Arizona University research scientist Nathan E. Stone, Ph.D.; and Kimron Veterinary Institute researcher and department head Shlomo Blum, DVM, Ph.D.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"A
Elsio Wunder is an assistant professor of pathobiology and veterinary science in the UConn College of Agriculture, Health, and Natural Resources (CAHNR). (Jason Sheldon\/UConn Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The project, entitled \u201cNovel Protein Antigens as a Path to Improve Surveillance and Diagnostics of Bovine Leptospirosis,\u201d aims to significantly improve cattle ranchers\u2019 detection of leptospirosis, a disease caused by the bacteria <\/span>Leptospira<\/span><\/i>.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The disease can be tricky to diagnose, since infected cattle often do not show pronounced symptoms. Farmers may first notice something is wrong when their female cows start having reproductive issues.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cTo identify those animals in a herd is sometimes complicated,\u201d says Wunder. \u201cSome animals, they actually get a chronic form of the infection, so their kidneys are colonized \u2013 they don\u2019t necessarily have clinical signs of the disease, but they are secreting lepto into the environment.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Ranchers may perform blood tests on their herd, but existing tests are based on leptospirosis research from the 1950s and 1960s, says Wunder. Today\u2019s lepto landscape is different, with new strains constantly emerging.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Wunder has previously <\/span>received NIH funding<\/span><\/a> for his work on developing a <\/span>new leptospirosis vaccine<\/span>, using proteins that more closely match current circulating strains of the bacteria. His <\/span>patented vaccine<\/span><\/a> uses four proteins to protect against a wide range of lepto, in contrast to current inoculations which only include a few strains.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0This project builds on that work, while specifically focusing on diagnostic tests instead of vaccines.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThrough the work on the vaccine, I was able to identify several biologically relevant protein candidates,\u201d says Wunder. \u201cBecause those candidates are important to infection and protection, we thought they could also be important candidates for diagnostics.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Current diagnostic mechanisms test for each strain of <\/span>Leptospira<\/span><\/i> individually, meaning that \u201c20, 30, 40 antigens need to be used for a serum test\u201d for a given blood sample, says Wunder. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In contrast, his vision is a single test that uses just one or two proteins to identify infected animals, regardless of the strain they have been infected with.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThen we can quickly treat these animals and separate them from the herd,\u201d he says.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Leptospirosis can cause major economic losses for farmers, as it kills cattle or harms their reproductive and milk-producing capacity. It also poses a threat to humans, domestic animals, and wildlife, who can contract it from exposure to urine from infected cows, such as through environmental contamination. Left untreated, it can be fatal.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

If you don’t look, you don’t see it.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The disease is of particular concern in developing countries which lack adequate sanitation infrastructure and access to healthcare. Because of its status as a neglected disease or \u201cdisease of poverty,\u201d leptospirosis is less likely to receive research funding and attention. This can create a vicious cycle as the bacterium continues to multiply and infect different animals, without adequate safety mechanisms in place to protect animal, human, and environmental health.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIf you don’t look, you don’t see it, right?\u201d says Wunder. \u201cSo it becomes this hidden thing that could potentially become a major problem.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The idea that lepto isn\u2019t a risk in the United States is a misconception, he says \u2013 one he is working tirelessly to combat.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIf you look at the science, you can see that not only is it here, but things are changing,\u201d he says. \u201cNew, more problematic strains are coming up. … <\/span>And a lot of the time, we don’t know the risks they pose to human health.\u201d<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Recently, Wunder says, leptospirosis cases have risen in New York, Chicago, and California. He foresees the problem intensifying in the coming years, as a warming climate, more rain, and increased social inequality provide ideal conditions for bacteria like <\/span>Leptospira <\/span><\/i>to proliferate.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Cattle all over the United States do contract lepto, including strains in the vaccine and new strains. Working with farmers in Connecticut, he has found cows \u2014 even vaccinated ones \u2013 excreting the bacteria into the environment.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

This points to a need for both more effective vaccines and more effective tests. Wunder\u2019s lab is hard at work on both.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Elsio Wunder awarded BARD grant to improve understanding of costly disease<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":175,"featured_media":248767,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2224,2460,2302,2076,2235],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2413],"class_list":["post-248765","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cahnr","category-faculty","category-pathobiology-veterinary-science","category-research","category-today-homepage"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-09-09 06:35:04","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248765","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/175"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=248765"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248765\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":248917,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/248765\/revisions\/248917"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/248767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=248765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=248765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=248765"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=248765"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=248765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}