Abstract
Papillomaviruses (PV) are associated with epithelial malignancies in animals, including cancer in humans. Limited knowledge exists regarding the evolutionary history of non-human PV. We assessed the phylogeography of PV with emphasis in wildlife hosts. We explored the phylogenetic, geographic, and environmental relationships of PV and hosts applying Bayesian inference and spatial analyses of virus and hosts. We found that the available wildlife PV data support previous reports on the higher incidence of fibropapillomatosis over carcinoma in humans and wildlife, being mammals the most common host. We also found geographic bias on the available wildlife papillomavirus (WPV) information towards the Northern Hemisphere, which may have influenced our results to show Europe as the most likely origin of the available WPV lineages. Therefore, we highlight the need for detailed studies on the presence of WPV in regions and species not included in this study (e.g., reptiles from the tropics) to better inform sites of WPV origin, susceptible species, and spillover potential. Future studies of the clinical and subclinical occurrence, distribution, and phylogenetic signatures of WPV may help understand the spread, virulence, and epidemiology of PV in general. From an evolutionary perspective, our overview suggests that WPV are a promising host-pathogen system to untangle questions regarding co-evolution due to its large geographic distribution and occurrence in a wide variety of aquatic and terrestrial wildlife species.
Highlights
Papillomaviruses (PV) are small, non-enveloped DNA viruses known to produce lesions on the skin and mucous membranes of various species (Houten et al, 2001; Villiers et al, 2004; Dyne et al, 2018)
Our goal was to respond to the questions: Are wildlife papillomavirus (WPV) found under tractable and quantifiable phylogenetic, geographic, and environmental conditions? Can we reconstruct the evolutionary history of the virus? And, can the available data reveal ecological patterns of WPV and its hosts? Exploring these questions can help elaborate new hypotheses of WPV evolution to guide future research in disease ecology and biogeography
We reviewed PV records in animals from scientific literature using the keywords “wildlife” + “papillomavirus” + “genome” in the Web of Science and Scopus databases to collect the most available reports of genetic information worldwide to understand the evolutionary history of the virus
Summary
Papillomaviruses (PV) are small, non-enveloped DNA viruses known to produce lesions on the skin (warts) and mucous membranes (condylomas) of various species (Houten et al, 2001; Villiers et al, 2004; Dyne et al, 2018). Most of the effort to understand the evolutionary history of PV has been focused on human papillomaviruses (HPV) and PVs in domestic animals (Howley, 1986; Villiers, 1989; Houten et al, 2001; Filippis et al, 2002; Diniz et al, 2009; Orlando et al, 2011). A few studies are available on wildlife hosts (e.g., Bravo et al, 2010; Gottschling et al, 2011), showing the considerable gaps of knowledge regarding our understanding of PV ecology in the wild
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
