Skip to main content

ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Vet. Sci.
Sec. Veterinary Infectious Diseases
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fvets.2024.1472595

Anaplasma phagocytophilum infection in wild small mammals in western Yunnan province, China

Provisionally accepted
Jun-jie Zhu Jun-jie Zhu 1Hong-ze Zhang Hong-ze Zhang 1Ru-dan Hong Ru-dan Hong 1Dan Yu Dan Yu 1Mei Hong Mei Hong 2Zheng-xiang Liu Zheng-xiang Liu 2Dong-mei Li Dong-mei Li 3,4,5Jia-xiang Yin Jia-xiang Yin 1*
  • 1 Dali University, Dali, China
  • 2 Yunnan Institute of Endemic Diseases Control and Prevention, Dali, China
  • 3 Chinese Center For Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, China
  • 4 State Key Laboratory of Infectious Disease Prevention and Control, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, Beijing Municipality, China
  • 5 National Institute for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC), Beijing, Beijing Municipality, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Anaplasma phagocytophilum (A. phagocytophilum) is an emerging zoonotic pathogen that causes human granulocytic anaplasmosis, which small mammal species have been implicated as important reservoir hosts. However, little surveillance for A. phagocytophilum has been conducted on small mammals in this region. This study was to evaluate the role small mammals play in A. phagocytophilum transmission in Yunnan province. Small mammals were captured seasonally from three counties located in western Yunnan province. We screened the samples for A. phagocytophilum infection using a nested polymerase chain reaction (nested-PCR) to target 16S rRNA gene of them, and sequenced positive samples. Returned sequences were queried, using the Basic Local Alignment Search Tool (BLAST) searches and a phylogenetic tree was constructed by MEGA software. A total of 1605 small mammals belonging to 30 species, 18 genera, 6 families, 3 orders were captured seasonally in this region. The infection rate of A. phagocytophilum in small mammals was 0.93% (15/1605). Significant differences in infection rates were observed on species, counties, and habitat. The 16Sr RNA genes of A. phagocytophilum were clustered into two branches, which demonstrated the genetic diversity. Our results showed that there was infection with genetic variants of A. phagocytophilum in small mammals from three counties in Yunnan province.

    Keywords: Anaplasma phagocytophilum, Small mammals, genetic diversity, Yunnan Province, infection rate

    Received: 29 Jul 2024; Accepted: 17 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Zhu, Zhang, Hong, Yu, Hong, Liu, Li and Yin. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Jia-xiang Yin, Dali University, Dali, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.