Haemoplasma prevalence and diversity in three invasive Rattus species from Gauteng Province, South Africa

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dc.contributor.author Retief, Liezl
dc.contributor.author Chimimba, Christian Timothy
dc.contributor.author Oosthuizen, Marinda C.
dc.contributor.author Matshotshi, Asiashu
dc.contributor.author Bastos, Armanda
dc.date.accessioned 2023-09-21T07:03:14Z
dc.date.available 2023-09-21T07:03:14Z
dc.date.issued 2022-08-12
dc.description DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT : Publicly available datasets were analyzed in this study. These data can be found here: [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genbank/] (accessed on 9 August 2021). en_US
dc.description SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL : FIGURE S1. (a) Trimmed 120 nt fragment of the chromatogram generated when screening ectoparasite sampled using the primer setMyClost-F/Mycop-R. The colour lines denote the four nucleotide bases: adenine (A) is indicated in green, cytosine (C) is indicated in blue, guanine (G) is indicated in black and thymine (T) is indicated in red. (b) Alignment result to MK295631 produced when performing a nucleotide blast (BlastN) search for the 120 nt 16S rRNA gene fragment generated when screening a Haemaphysalis elliptica tick for haemoplasma prevalence using the MyClost-F/Mycop-R primer set. TABLE S1: Sample list of Rattus species and their associated ectoparasites screened in this study; TABLE S2: Nucleotide BlastN results obtained when performing nucleotide blast searches against the Genbank database for sequences generated when screening ectoparasites with the Myco-16S-322s/HemMycop16S-1420as primer set. TABLE S3: PCR results obtained when screening DNA extracted from buccal swabs, kidney samples, and ectoparasite samples using haemoplasma-specific PCR assays targeting the Rnase P gene region [12]. PCR screening and nucleotide sequencing revealed that samples either failed to amplify or produced non-target sequences. en_US
dc.description.abstract Invasive Rattus species are carriers of haemotropic Mycoplasmas (haemoplasmas) globally, but data from Africa are lacking. Using a PCR-sequencing approach, we assessed haemoplasma prevalence and diversity in kidney and buccal swabs collected from three invasive Rattus species (Rattus rattus, R. norvegicus and R. tanezumi) in Gauteng Province, South Africa. Whilst the overall sequence-confirmed haemoplasma prevalence was 38.4%, infection rates in R. rattus (58.3%) were significantly higher ( 2 = 12.96; df = 2; n = 99 p < 0.05) than for R. tanezumi (14.3%). Differences between host sex ( 2 = 3.59 1031; df = 1; n = 99; p = 1.00) and age ( 2 = 4.28; df = 2; n = 99; p = 0.12) were not significant. Whilst buccal (1.01%) and ectoparasite positivity (2.13%) were low, these results suggest that multiple transmission routes are possible. Three phylogenetically distinct lineages, consistent with global rat-associated strains described to date, were detected, namely, ‘Candidatus Mycoplasma haemomuris subsp. Ratti’, and two Rattus-specific haemoplasmas that are yet to be formally described. These results expand the known distribution of invasive rat-associated haemoplasmas and highlight the potential for pathogen co-invasion of new territories together with invading rodent hosts. en_US
dc.description.department Mammal Research Institute en_US
dc.description.department Veterinary Tropical Diseases en_US
dc.description.department Zoology and Entomology en_US
dc.description.librarian am2023 en_US
dc.description.sponsorship The National Research Foundation (NRF), the University of Pretoria, a US Federal Funded Scholarship and Department of Veterinary Tropical Diseases, University of Pretoria (DVTD) Belgian grant. en_US
dc.description.uri https://www.mdpi.com/journal/microorganisms en_US
dc.identifier.citation Retief, L.; Chimimba, C.T.; Oosthuizen, M.C.; Matshotshi, A.; Bastos, A.D.S. Haemoplasma Prevalence and Diversity in Three Invasive Rattus Species from Gauteng Province, South Africa. Microorganisms 2022, 10, 1632. https://doi.org/10.3390/microorganisms10081632. en_US
dc.identifier.issn 2076-2607 (online)
dc.identifier.other 10.3390/microorganisms10081632
dc.identifier.uri http://hdl.handle.net/2263/92360
dc.language.iso en en_US
dc.publisher MDPI en_US
dc.rights © 2022 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license. en_US
dc.subject Mycoplasma en_US
dc.subject Haemoplasmas en_US
dc.subject Rattus rattus en_US
dc.subject Rattus tanezumi en_US
dc.subject Rattus norvegicus en_US
dc.subject Phylogeny en_US
dc.subject 16S rRNA en_US
dc.subject Rnase P en_US
dc.subject dnaK en_US
dc.subject gapA en_US
dc.subject Gauteng Province, South Africa
dc.title Haemoplasma prevalence and diversity in three invasive Rattus species from Gauteng Province, South Africa en_US
dc.type Article en_US


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