已知在蝙蝠上发现的外寄生虫含有重要的微生物。然而,这些专性寄生虫所携带的病毒尚未得到充分研究。这导致了对这些外寄生虫在病毒维持和从蝙蝠传播到其他相互作用物种和环境中的潜在作用的近乎监督。这里,我们采样了蝙蝠外寄生虫,它们寄生了犀牛科中多种蝙蝠物种的选择,白衣蛇科,巨型科,云南省的斑科和翼科,中国。我们表明,与雌性蝙蝠相比,雄性蝙蝠的体外寄生虫患病率普遍较高。发现大多数外寄生虫落在Nycteribiidae内,Spinturnicidae和Streblidae蝙蝠外寄生虫科。我们随后应用了从汇集的体外寄生虫制备的文库的非偏倚测序,然后对结果读数进行以计算机病毒为中心的分析。我们表明,被采样的蝙蝠家族所寄养的外寄生虫被发现携带,除了一组不同的噬菌体,脊椎动物和昆虫病毒科,子囊病毒科,Chuviridae,圆环病毒科,黄病毒科,Hepadnaviridae,Hepevirridae,疱疹病毒科,轮状病毒科,马赛莱维科,奈罗病毒科,正粘病毒科,细小病毒科,痘病毒科,呼肠孤病毒科,逆转录病毒科,和弹状病毒科。我们进一步报道了通过两个独立的下一代测序数据分析管道预测的部分细小病毒VP1/VP2基因和部分痘病毒泛素样基因。这项研究描述了蝙蝠体外寄生虫的自然病毒传播,为了解这些外寄生虫在病毒维持和传播给其他动物中的作用提供了一个平台。
Ectoparasites found on bats are known to contain important microbes. However, the viruses hosted by these obligate parasites are understudied. This has led to the near oversight of the potential role of these ectoparasites in virus maintenance and transmission from bats to other interacting species and the environment. Here, we sampled bat ectoparasites parasitizing a diverse selection of bat species in the families Rhinolophidae, Vespertilionidae, Megadermatidae, Hipposideridae and Pteropodidae in Yunnan Province, China. We show that the ectoparasite prevalence was generally higher in male compared to female bats. Most ectoparasites were found to fall within the
Nycteribiidae, Spinturnicidae and Streblidae bat ectoparasite families. We subsequently applied a non-biased sequencing of libraries prepared from the pooled ectoparasites, followed by an in-silico virus-centric analysis of the resultant reads. We show that ectoparasites hosted by the sampled families of bats are found to carry, in addition to a diverse set of phages, vertebrate and insect viruses in the families Aliusviridae, Ascoviridae, Chuviridae, Circoviridae, Flaviviridae, Hepadnaviridae, Hepeviridae, Herpesviridae, Iridoviridae, Marseilleviridae, Nairoviridae, Orthomyxoviridae, Parvoviridae, Poxviridae, Reoviridae, Retroviridae, and Rhabdoviridae. We further report a partial Parvovirus VP1/VP2 gene and partial Poxvirus ubiquitin-like gene predicted by two independent next generation sequencing data analysis pipelines. This study describes the natural virome of bat ectoparasites, providing a platform for understanding the role these ectoparasites play in the maintenance and spread of viruses to other animals.