Giovanni Franzo

1. IntroductionAvian metapneumovirus (aMPV) is a highly infective virus that affects turkeys and chickens, causing turkey rhinotracheitis (TRT) and swollen head syndrome (SHS), respectively. aMPV also has the capacity to infect other avian species [1–3]. The virus is primarily associated with upper respiratory infections, predisposing birds to opportunistic bacterial pathogens, which ca ...

1. IntroductionEscherichia coli is a Gram-negative bacterium that typically inhabits the intestine of vertebrates and is considered a usual member of the digestive flora in animals. However, under favorable circumstances, it may acquire genes associated with pathogenicity/virulence and cause clinical disease in most domestic farmed species. Colibacillosis is a systemic fatal disease, which occurs ...

Infectious bronchitis (IB) was described in the USA for the first time as a respiratory disease of chickens. Its aetiological agent was isolated in 1936 and then identified as a Gammacoronavirus, namely infectious bronchitis virus (IBV) (Cook et al. 2012). Being a single-stranded RNA virus, IBV is highly susceptible to spontaneous mutation and genetic recombination, meaning that a large number of ...