RESUMO
Bartonellosis is an emerging serious diseases of zoonotic relevance caused by an expanding number of recently discovered species of Bartonella. Many studies use partial gltA gene sequencing as the method of choice for species attribution, and a plethora of studies have utilized only this gene to describe Bartonella diversity. We observe a lack of correspondence between the phylogenies constructed using the complete gltA gene sequences and the small gene fragment usually used in phylogenetic analyzes. Everything indicates that important changes occurred by using larger fragments. Therefore, it is of great importance to define a minimum gltA fragment length to be used in future phylogenetic analyzes, besides the use of other genes.
Assuntos
Proteínas de Bactérias/genética , Bartonella/genética , Filogenia , Bartonella/classificação , Bartonella/isolamento & purificação , DNA Bacteriano/genética , Genótipo , Reação em Cadeia da PolimeraseRESUMO
Zoonotic pathogens comprise a significant and increasing fraction of all emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases that plague humans. Identifying host species is one of the keys to controlling emerging infectious diseases. From March 2007 until April 2012, we collected a total of 131 wild rodents in eight municipalities of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. We investigated these rodents for infection with Coxiella burnetii, Bartonella spp. and Rickettsia spp. In total, 22.1% (29/131) of the rodents were infected by at least one pathogen; co-infection was detected in 1.5% (2/131) of rodents. Coxiella burnetii was detected in 4.6% (6/131) of the wild animals, 17.6% of the rodents harbored Bartonella spp. No cases of Rickettsia were identified. Bartonella doshiae and Bartonella vinsonii were the species found on the wild mammals. This report is the first to note C. burnetii, B. doshiae and B. vinsonii natural infections in Atlantic Forest wild rodents in Brazil. Our work highlights the potential risk of transmission to humans, since most of the infected specimens belong to generalist species that live near human dwellings.
