Molecular Identification of a Novel Hantavirus in Malaysian Bronze Tube-Nosed Bats (Murina aenea).

Brigitta Zana,Nurul Tahir,Tamás Görföl,Henrietta Papp,Gábor Tóth,Ferenc Jakab,Safia Zeghbib,Gábor Csorba,Fanni Földes,Mónika Madai,Dóra Buzás,Péter Urbán,Faisal Khan,Róbert Herczeg,Gábor Kemenesi

doi:10.3390/v11100887

Brigitta Zana, Nurul Tahir + Show 13 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/v11100887

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Abstract

In the past ten years, several novel hantaviruses were discovered in shrews, moles, and bats, suggesting the dispersal of hantaviruses in many animal taxa other than rodents during their evolution. Interestingly, the coevolutionary analyses of most recent studies have raised the possibility that nonrodents may have served as the primordial mammalian host and harboured the ancestors of rodent-borne hantaviruses as well. The aim of our study was to investigate the presence of hantaviruses in bat lung tissue homogenates originally collected for taxonomic purposes in Malaysia in 2015. Hantavirus-specific nested RT-PCR screening of 116 samples targeting the L segment of the virus has revealed the positivity of two lung tissue homogenates originating from two individuals, a female and a male of the Murina aenea bat species collected at the same site and sampling occasion. Nanopore sequencing of hantavirus positive samples resulted in partial genomic data from S, M, and L genome segments. The obtained results indicate molecular evidence for hantaviruses in the M. aenea bat species. Sequence analysis of the PCR amplicon and partial genome segments suggests that the identified virus may represent a novel species in the Mobatvirus genus within the Hantaviridae family. Our results provide additional genomic data to help extend our knowledge about the evolution of these viruses.

Highlights

Hantaviruses (Hantaviridae) cause two types of life-threatening human diseases, haemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome (HFRS) in Eurasia and hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome (HCPS)in the Americas [1]
Hantavirus RNA was detected in two Bronze Tube-nosed Bat (M. aenea) lung tissue samples from Gunung Mulu National Park, Malaysia (Figure 1)
All attempts to amplify the complete genome of this hantavirus failed, despite the fact we applied a combination of multiple primers (Table 1) as was previously described [18,19]

Summary

Introduction

Hantaviruses (Hantaviridae) cause two types of life-threatening human diseases, haemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome (HFRS) in Eurasia and hantavirus cardiopulmonary syndrome (HCPS)in the Americas [1]. Recent studies described several novel hantaviruses in shrews, moles, and bats, suggesting the dispersal of hantaviruses in several animal taxa during their evolution [2]. Phylogenetic analyses of most recent studies have raised the possibility that bats or other animals (shrews and moles) of the Laurasiatheria superorder may have served as the primordial mammalian host, and harboured the ancestors of rodent-borne hantaviruses [5,7]. Complex analyses for the genetic diversity and phylogeography of bat-associated hantaviruses are tentative, since complete genomic data is available only from Brno virus (BRNV), Dakrong virus (DKGV), Láibın virus (LAIV), Quezon virus (QZNV), and Xuân Sơn virus (XSV). In the case of other bat-associated hantaviruses just partial genomic fragments are available, mainly from the conservative L segment, hardening the implementation of evolutionary analyses [5,6,8]

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