Secretory-excretory antigens of Toxocara canis recognized by puppies of the Mexico City metropolitan area

The aim of the study was to determine the Toxocoro canis larvae secretory-excretory antigens (SETc-Ag), which are most often recognized by puppies infected natura I ly from the metropolitan area of Mexico City. At necropsy, adult phases of T. canis were found in the intestine of 20 Puppies (64.6%), and 11 had no parasites (35.4%). Sera of a all animals wit h T canis in the intestine and seven animals without worms were positive to ELISA (X = 0.683 +/- 0.184 OD) and recognized several SETc-Ag by Western blot (WB). Sera from four puppies with no T. canis did not recognize any type of antigen by WB and were negative to ELISA-IgG (X = 0.078 +/- 0.045 0D). Sera from the Puppies recognized three antigen groups. The first on(, included seven low molecular weight antigens (16, 20, 23, 24, 28, 32 and 38 kDa); the second one, three high molecular weight antigens (400, 200 and 120 kDa) and the third one, four antigens of intermediate molecular weight (86, 74, 66 and 47 kDa). The most frequently recognized SETc-Ag were of 32, 38, 66, 120 and 200 kDa, which makes them good candidate antigens to develop immunodiagnosis tests in dogs.