Electron microscopic study of the African strain of malignant catarrhal fever virus in bovine cell cultures.

Malignant catarrhal fever (African strain) is a viral disease of ruminants which is considered an exotic disease in the United States. Viral isolates obtained from one clinically ill gaur (Bos gaurus) and a greater kudu (Tragelaphus strepsiceros) located in a zoologic park in Oklahoma, and from one heifer (Bos taurus) and a domestic white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) experimentally inoculated with the isolated and identified African strain of malignant catarrhal fever virus (MCFV), were each studied in bovine cell cultures by electron microscopy. Certain of the viral isolated were previously characterized as MCFV by serologic and morphologic examinations, their cytopathic effect in cell cultures, and their ability to reproduce disease in a ruminant host. The virions of MCFV (African) examined by electron microscopy were icosahedral similar to herpes-virus, were between 98 and 194 nm, developed in the nucleus and matured in the cytoplasm of the cell, and exhibited budding. The virus in infected cells passed through the nuclear and plasma membranes and also into cytoplasmic vesicles from which it acquired one or more envelopes. Virions of malignant catarrhal fever were closely associated with the cellular endoplasmic reticulum, and aberrant morphologic forms of MCFV were observed in virus-infected cells.