Abstract
Despite the worldwide occurrence of bartonellae in a broad range of mammal species, in which they usually cause a long-lasting erythrocytic bacteremia, few studies reported Bartonella spp. in avian hosts. The present work aimed to investigate the occurrence and molecular identity of Bartonella spp. infecting birds in the Pantanal wetland, central-western Brazil using a multigene approach. For this purpose, blood samples were collected from 517 individuals from 13 avian orders in the states of Mato Grosso and Mato Groso do Sul. DNA was extracted from avian blood and 500/517 (96.7%) samples were positive in a conventional PCR targeting the avian β-actin gene. Nineteen (3.8%) out of 500 avian blood samples were positive in a qPCR assay for Bartonella spp. based on the nuoG gene. Among 19 avian blood DNA samples positive in the qPCR for Bartonella spp., 12 were also positive in the qPCR for Bartonella based on the 16S-23S RNA Intergenic region (ITS). In the PCR assays performed for molecular characterization, one 16S rRNA, three ribC, and one nuoG sequences were obtained. Based on BLASTn results, while 1 nuoG, 2 ribC, and 2 ITS sequences showed high identity to Bartonella henselae, one 16S rRNA and 2 ITS showed high similarity to Bartonella machadoae in the sampled birds. Bartonella spp. related to B. henselae and B. machadoae were detected, for the first time, in wild birds from the Brazilian Pantanal.
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Data availability
The sequences generated during the study were submitted in the NCBI Genbank (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/genbank/). Sequences can be accessed by the following accession numbers: OR809206, OR834130, OR834127, OR834128, OR834129, OR840546, OR852822 and OR840547.
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Acknowledgements
This research supported by “Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo” (FAPESP) (Process #2022/08543-2) e CNPq (Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico; Productivity Fellowship conceived to MRA [Process CNPq #303701/2021-8]). ASAC received Ph.D. Scholarship from FAPESP (Process #2020/14948-0) and CAPES-PROEX (code 001).
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This research was financially supported by Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP) (Process 2022/08543–2) e CNPq (Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico; Productivity Fellowship conceived to Dr. Marcos Rogério André [Process CNPq nº 303701/2021–8]). Amir Salvador Alabí Córdova received Ph.D. Scholarship from FAPESP (Process #2020/14948–0) and CAPES-PROEX (code 001).
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All authors contributed significantly to the conception of the research. Methodology, Validation, Investigation, Data curation, Writing- Original Draft, Visualization, Writing review and editing was performed by Amir Salvador Alabí Córdova; Resources, Methodology, Writing review and editing performed by Alan Fecchio; Investigation, Writing review and editing performed by Ana Cláudia Calchi; Investigation, Writing review and editing performed by Clara Morato Dias; Writing review and editing performed by Rosangela Zacarias Machado; Project administration, Funding acquisition, Supervision, Conceptualization, Writing- Original Draft, Writing review and editing, Resources performed by Marcos Rogério André.
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All authors contributed significantly to the conception of the research. Methodology, Validation, Investigation, Data curation, Writing- Original Draft, Visualization, Writing review and editing was performed by Amir Salvador Alabí Córdova; Resources, Methodology, Writing review and editing performed by Alan Fecchio; Investigation, Writing review and editing performed by Ana Cláudia Calchi; Investigation, Writing review and editing performed by Clara Morato Dias; Writing review and editing performed by Rosangela Zacarias Machado; Project administration, Funding acquisition, Supervision, Conceptualization, Writing- Original Draft, Writing review and editing, Resources performed by Marcos Rogério André.
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Alabí Córdova, A.S., Fecchio, A., Calchi, A.C. et al. Molecular evidence of Bartonella spp. in tropical wild birds from the Brazilian Pantanal, the largest wetland in South America. Vet Res Commun (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11259-024-10341-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11259-024-10341-z