Cross-Species Transmission of a Novel Adenovirus Associated with a Fulminant Pneumonia Outbreak in a New World Monkey Colony

PLoS Pathogens

Abigail Spinner¹  Sally P. Mendoza¹  David P. Schnurr¹  Ann Rosenthal¹  Nicole Maninger¹  Karen L. Bales¹  Eunice C. Chen²  Nicholas W. Lerche³  Shigeo Yagi⁴  Kristi R. Kelly⁵  Charles Y. Chiu⁵ 

[1] California National Primate Research Center, University of California Davis, Davis, California, United States of America;Department of Laboratory Medicine, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California, United States of America;Department of Psychology, University of California Davis, Davis, California, United States of America;UCSF-Abbott Viral Diagnostics and Discovery Center, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California, United States of America;Viral and Rickettsial Disease Laboratory, California Department of Public Health, Richmond, California, United States of America

关键词: Adenoviruses;    New World monkeys;    Sequence alignment;    Respiratory infections;    Mammalian genomics;    Polymerase chain reaction;    Macaque;    Rhesus monkeys;   

DOI  :  10.1371/journal.ppat.1002155

学科分类：生物科学（综合）

来源: Public Library of Science

【 摘 要 】

Adenoviruses are DNA viruses that naturally infect many vertebrates, including humans and monkeys, and cause a wide range of clinical illnesses in humans. Infection from individual strains has conventionally been thought to be species-specific. Here we applied the Virochip, a pan-viral microarray, to identify a novel adenovirus (TMAdV, titi monkey adenovirus) as the cause of a deadly outbreak in a closed colony of New World monkeys (titi monkeys; Callicebus cupreus) at the California National Primate Research Center (CNPRC). Among 65 titi monkeys housed in a building, 23 (34%) developed upper respiratory symptoms that progressed to fulminant pneumonia and hepatitis, and 19 of 23 monkeys, or 83% of those infected, died or were humanely euthanized. Whole-genome sequencing of TMAdV revealed that this adenovirus is a new species and highly divergent, sharing <57% pairwise nucleotide identity with other adenoviruses. Cultivation of TMAdV was successful in a human A549 lung adenocarcinoma cell line, but not in primary or established monkey kidney cells. At the onset of the outbreak, the researcher in closest contact with the monkeys developed an acute respiratory illness, with symptoms persisting for 4 weeks, and had a convalescent serum sample seropositive for TMAdV. A clinically ill family member, despite having no contact with the CNPRC, also tested positive, and screening of a set of 81 random adult blood donors from the Western United States detected TMAdV-specific neutralizing antibodies in 2 individuals (2/81, or 2.5%). These findings raise the possibility of zoonotic infection by TMAdV and human-to-human transmission of the virus in the population. Given the unusually high case fatality rate from the outbreak (83%), it is unlikely that titi monkeys are the native host species for TMAdV, and the natural reservoir of the virus is still unknown. The discovery of TMAdV, a novel adenovirus with the capacity to infect both monkeys and humans, suggests that adenoviruses should be monitored closely as potential causes of cross-species outbreaks.

【 授权许可】

CC BY