Papillomaviruses are a family small DNA viruses that infect the skin and internal squamous mucosae of most vertebrate species including man, tending to be both species and tissue specific.  To date, after classification by genotype more than 80 types of human papillomavirus (HPV) have been isolated and sequenced (Delius, Saegling et al. 1998).  The viruses are associated with a variety of disorders ranging from benign warts (papillomas) to cancer.

Canine Oral Papillomavirus (COPV) induces florid warts on the oral mucosa of both domestic dogs and wild canids (review see Nicholls and Stanley 1999).  Typically, COPV has an incubation period of 4-8 weeks followed by spontaneous immune-mediated regression within a further 4-8 weeks, the benign lesions rarely cause problems but cases of non-regressing warts that are refractory to treatment have been noted (Nicholls et al. 1999)  Squamous cell carcinomas have also been associated with canine papillomavirus (Bregman, Hirth et al. 1987; Teifke, Lohr et al. 1998).  In our group we are using this model to study papillomavirus life cycle (Nicholls et al. 2001) and the hosts immune response to the virus (Nicholls et al. 2001) , as well as the development of vaccines (Stanley et al. 2001).

Immunostaining of COPV late protein L1: Electron Micrograph of COPV:

RNA in situ hybridisation of COPV L1:

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References:

Bregman, C. L., Hirth, R. S.et al. (1987). "Cutaneous neoplasms in dogs associated with canine oral papillomavirus vaccine." Vet-Pathol. Nov; 24(6): 477-87.
Delius, H.,Saegling, B. et al. (1998). "The genomes of three of four novel HPV types, defined by differences of their L1 genes, show high conservation of the E7 gene and the URR." Virology. 240(2): 359-65.
Teifke J. P., Lohr C. V. et al. (1998). "Detection of canine oral papillomavirus-DNA in canine oral squamous cell carcinomas and p53 overexpressing skin papillomas of the dog using the polymerase chain reaction and non-radioactive in situ hybridization." Vet-Microbiol. Feb 28; 60(2-4): 119-30.
Nicholls, P. K., Klaunberg, B. A., Moore, R. A., Santos, E. B., Parry, N. R., Gough, G. W. and Stanley, M. A. (1999). "Naturally-occurring, non-regressing canine oral papillomavirus infection: host immunity, virus characterisation and experimental infection." Virology 265: 365-374
Nicholls P. K. and Stanley M. A. (1999). "Canine papillomavirus - A centenary review." J. Comp. Pathol. 120: 219-233.
Nicholls, P. K. and Stanley, M. A. (2000). "The Immunology of Animal Papillomaviruses." Vet Immunol Immunopathol. Feb 8; 73(2): 101-127
Nicholls P.,Doorbar J., Moore R., Peh W., Anderson D. and Stanley M. (2001) "Detection of Viral DNA and E4 Protein in Basal Keratinocytes of Experimental Canine Oral Papillomavirus Lesions." Virology. In Press.
Stanley M., Moore R., Nicholls P., Santos E., Thomsen L., Parry N., Walcott S. and Gough G. (2001) "Intra-epithelial vaccination with COPV L1 DNA by particle-mediated DNA delivery protects against mucosal challenge with infectious COPV in beagle dogs." Vaccine. In Press:2783-2792.
Nicholls, P., Moore, P., Anderson, D., Moore, R., Parry, N., Gough, G. and Stanley, M. (2001). "Regression of Canine Oral Papillomas is Associated with Infiltration of CD4+ and CD8+ Lymphocytes." Virology. In Press.