Porcine circovirus type II screening in feral swine population in Ukraine

Abstract

Porcine circovirus type 2 (PCV2) is an emergent single-stranded DNA virus found all over the world in domestic pigs and wild boars that causes infectious disease with a great impact on swine productivity. PCV2 has 1.7 kb genome that includes two main genes, which encode replication-related protein (rep) and the major structural capsid (cap) protein. Both of these genes can be used as target sequences for the primer design for the detection of PCV2 as well as for sequencing of designated regions. We carried out a screening due to the PCV2 circulating among the wild boar population in 10 regions of Ukraine. PCR screening was performed using primer pairs designed on the target sequences of the replicative and capsid genes. According to the results of the research, the presence of genetic material of PCV2 was found in 31.8% of the tested samples. The developed set of primers may be suitable for diagnostics, as well as for the development of specific sites for the purpose of sequencing of PCV2 cap-gene due to the obtained DNA samples during epizootic screening