Individual heterogeneity in erythrocyte susceptibility to Babesia divergens is a critical factor for the outcome of experimental spleen-intact sheep infections

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Table II.

Humoral response of sheep to infection by B. divergens. Spleen-intact sheep with in vitro refractory (R) or susceptible (S) erythrocytes were infected with B. divergens Rouen F5. At 5 time points, the humoral response was monitored by ELISA (raw values corresponding to the mean absorbance of triplicate wells and standard deviations are indicated).

	Sheep reference (parasite form and infection route)
	8^a R (M – IP)	28^a R (M – SC)	3464 S (iRBC – IV)	3490 S (iRBC – IP)	3198 S (M – IP)	3489 S (M – SC)
Day of infection	0.128 ± 0.006	0.127 ± 0.008	0.173 ± 0.012	0.088 ± 0.04	0.059 ± 0.016	0.101 ± 0.026
Week 1 post infection	0.171 ± 0.014	0.162 ± 0.021	0.213 ± 0.009	0.289 ± 0.013	0.242 ± 0.029	0.29 ± 0.039
Week 3 post infection	0.322 ± 0.025	0.417 ± 0.036	0.612 ± 0.021	0.737 ± 0.068	0.589 ± 0.022	0.6 ± 0.021
Week 6 post infection	0.095 ± 0.032	0.244 ± 0.013	0.783 ± 0.004	2.116 ± 0.117	0.443 ± 0.045	1.606 ± 0.066
Week 8 post infection	nd	nd	1.054 ± 0.058	2.168 ± 0.085	0.611 ± 0.016	1.435 ± 0.084

Sheep with refractory erythrocytes were selected from the sheep population described in Figure 4. Sheep were infected either with merozoites (M), or iRBC, and by intravenous (IV), intraperitoneal (IP) or subcutaneous (SC) routes.

nd: Not done at that time point.