Although virtually unknown in Europe since the widespread adoption of artificial insemination (AI), infection by the sexually transmitted protozoan parasite Tritrichomonas foetus (Fig. 1) results in substantial economic losses throughout the major cattle-rearing areas of the world where natural breeding is relied upon. Infection by T. foetus is increasingly recognized as a significant cause of bovine infertility. In this review, Alex Yule, Susan Skirrow and Robert BonDurant summarize the current knowledge of bovine trichomoniasis and the problems of diagnosis and control of this economically important disease.

The activity of bacitracin in vitro against Giardia intestinalis, Trichomonas vaginalis and Tritrichomonas foetus was enhanced 5-10 times by equimolar concentrations of zinc. Bacitracin and bacitracin zinc activity was tolerant to either aerobic or anaerobic culture conditions and equally effective against T. vaginalis isolates sensitive or insensitive to metronidazole. This enhancement was not due to zinc toxicity and was zinc dose dependent.

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Direct comparative studies between a radio-immune antiglobulin test (RIAT), an enzyme-linked antiglobulin test (ELAT) and a haemagglutination assay (HA) were carried out using anti-RBC hybridoma culture supernatants, monoclonal antibodies of established specificity, and immune mouse sera. The direct comparisons revealed that in many cases, RIAT and ELAT were slightly more sensitive than HA for the detection and study of anti-RBC antibodies. RIAT and ELAT detect non-agglutinating antibodies and sub-agglutinating concentrations of antibodies which would be missed if HA is used as the only screening test for hybridoma supernatants.