Metagenomic analysis of viromes of dromedary camel fecal samples reveals large number and high diversity of circoviruses and picobirnaviruses

Abstract

The recent discovery of Middle East Respiratory Coronavirus and another novel dromedary camel coronavirus UAE-HKU23 in dromedaries has boosted interest in search of novel viruses in dromedaries. In this study, fecal samples of 203 dromedaries in Dubai were pooled and deep sequenced. Among the 7330 assembled viral contigs, 1970 were assigned to mammalian viruses. The largest groups of these contigs matched to Picobirnaviridae, Circoviridae, Picornaviridae, Parvoviridae, Astroviridae and Hepeviridae. Many of these viral families were previously unknown to dromedaries. In addition to the high abundance of contigs from Circoviridae (n=598 with 14 complete genomes) and Picobirnaviridae (n=1236), a high diversity of contigs from these two families was found, with the 14 Circoviridae complete genomes forming at least five clusters and contigs from both genogroup I and genogroup II potentially novel picobirnaviruses. Further studies comparing the incidence of these viral families in healthy and sick dromedaries will reveal their pathogenic potential.

The fecal virome of South and Central American children with diarrhea includes small circular DNA viral genomes of unknown origin

“…The first human-feces-associated PeCV was reported in a patient during an outbreak of acute gastroenteritis in the Netherlands (VS6600022) [27]. Other related genomes were found in feces from asymptomatic mammals [4, 24, 30]. Here, we also report PeCV genomes in human feces from Peru, Nicaragua and Chile, while diarrhea samples from Brazil and Venezuela were PCR negative.…”

“…For cycloviruses, the cellular hosts remain unknown but may include mammals and/or insects cells, or conceivably, originate from consumed animals or plants. Another distinct clade of viruses with CRESS-DNA genomes was also described in the feces of chimpanzees and other mammals, including pigs, rats [1, 3–5, 10, 18, 21, 22, 25, 26, 30], and recently humans [14], whose cellular hosts are also unknown. Yet another clade of CRESS-DNA genomes whose cellular hosts are not known was reported in the feces of pigs, seals, dromedaries and humans [4, 24, 27, 30].…”

Faecal virome of red foxes from peri-urban areas

“…The same group of authors identified that picobirnaviruses from different foxes were not identical. The divergence of picobirnaviruses within species has been proved previously in humans [27], pigs [28] and Dromedary camels [29].…”

A new densovirus in cerebrospinal fluid from a case of anti-NMDA-receptor encephalitis

“…Densoviruses are also frequently detected in mosquitos, showing variable degrees of pathogenicity [3, 23]. Densovirus sequences are also reported in feces of rodents [19], bats [8, 14], and camels [30]; likely reflecting viruses in their diets.…”