Genetic characterization of African swine fever virus from domestic pigs in India

Abstract

African swine fever (ASF) is the most dreaded disease of pigs, which can cause mortality of up to 100%. Following disease outbreaks with high mortality in pigs in two states of north‐east India, namely Arunachal Pradesh and Assam in early 2020, we confirmed the first occurrence of African swine fever (ASF) in domestic pigs in India by real‐time PCR, virus isolation and nucleotide sequencing. Genetic analyses in three independent genomic regions (B646L gene encoding the p72 protein, E183L gene encoding the p54 protein and the central variable region (CVR) of B602L gene) showed that the Indian ASF viruses are similar to the post‐2007‐p72‐genotype II viruses reported from Asia and Europe, suggesting the transboundary expansion of ongoing ASF outbreaks in the region.

Genotypic Characteristics of African Swine Fever Virus Maintained in Various Outbreaks in Vietnam During 2019-2021

“…With 10 aa tetramer repeats in CVR (BNDBNDBNAA), the ASFV strains in this study were classi ed into subgroup XXXII, along with the ASFV isolates in circulation in Vietnam (2019), the Chinese ASFV strains from outbreaks in 2018-2019, and other strains in Europe. At the same time, a study in India that performed B602L variable region analysis also showed that the tetrameric aa repeats in CVR are similar to other post-2007-p72-genotype II viruses reported from other Asian and European countries [30]. Although analysis of the CVR has identi ed it as the most variable genome region, Estonia isolates, belonging to the same genotype II classi cation based on the p72 genes and showing no difference in size and aa tetramers in the CVR genes, had the aa change of Y instead of C compared with the reference strain (Georgia_2007/1) [31].…”

Dynamics of African swine fever virus (ASFV) infection in domestic pigs infected with virulent, moderate virulent and attenuated genotype II ASFV European isolates

“…ASF is registered as one of the most important transboundary animal diseases (TADs), notifiable to OIE, and the wide recurrence of outbreaks in various regions of the world indicates that many questions are still poorly solved concerning the biology of this devastating disease. The ASFV strains circulating in Europe and Asia are of p72 genotype II (Gallardo et al., 2014; Ge et al., 2018; Kim et al., 2020; Mai et al., 2021; Malogolovkin et al., 2019; Rajukumar et al., 2021; Vilem et al., 2020), which are generally highly virulent both in domestic pigs and wild boar causing acute disease with almost 100% lethality in animals of all ages and sexes (Blome et al., 2020; Pikalo et al., 2019, 2020). However, one major concern is its increasing and continuous trend to appear and reappear in a clinically very mild or in a completely unapparent form in areas where the disease is endemic (Lamberga et al., 2018, 2020; Nurmoja et al., 2020; Sánchez‐Vizcaíno et al., 2012, 2015).…”

“…ASF is registered as one of the most important transboundary animal diseases (TADs), notifiable to OIE, and the wide recurrence of outbreaks in various regions of the world indicates that many questions are still poorly solved concerning the biology of this devastating disease. The ASFV strains circulating in Europe and Asia are of p72 genotype II (Gallardo et al, 2014;Ge et al, 2018;Kim et al, 2020;Mai et al, 2021;Malogolovkin et al, 2019;Rajukumar et al, 2021;Vilem et al, 2020), which are generally highly virulent both in domestic pigs and TA B L E 5 African swine fever virus (ASFV) comparative antibody detection in serum samples by ELISA and IPT indicated the first positive finding in days ± standard deviation (SD) and the percentage of positives domestic pigs 7± 0 (50%) 16 ± 0 (50%) 16 ± 0 (75%) Lv17/WB/Rie1 10 (100%) 7± 0 (100%) 19.5 ± 3.6 (100%) 19.5 ± 3.6 (100%) wild boar causing acute disease with almost 100% lethality in animals of all ages and sexes (Blome et al, 2020;Pikalo et al, 2019Pikalo et al, , 2020).…”

African Swine Fever, the forgotten pandemic

“…Understanding the genetic basis for ASFV spread and adaptation among hosts will facilitate vaccine development (Bao et al, 2021). As reported in this Special Issue, ASFV genotype II isolates identical to those isolated in China and Russia have also been found in Mongolia (Ankhanbaatar et al, 2021), in India (Rajukumar et al, 2021) and in Indonesia (Indi Dharmayanti et al, 2021), although ASFV variants in the domestic pig population in Vietnam have also been detected (Tran et al, 2021). Monitoring the genetic characteristics of ASFV isolates is needed to understand the spread of this disease across countries (Minoungou et al, 2021).…”