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Carrion crows (Corvus corone) of southwest Germany: important hosts for haemosporidian parasites

BACKGROUND: Avian malaria parasites (Plasmodium spp.) and other Haemosporida (Haemoproteus and Leucocytozoon spp.) form a diverse group of vector-transmitted blood parasites that are abundant in many bird families. Recent studies have suggested that corvids may be an important host for Plasmodium sp...

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Autores principales: Schmid, Sandrine, Fachet, Katrin, Dinkel, Anke, Mackenstedt, Ute, Woog, Friederike
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2017
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5596962/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28899382
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12936-017-2023-5
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author Schmid, Sandrine
Fachet, Katrin
Dinkel, Anke
Mackenstedt, Ute
Woog, Friederike
author_facet Schmid, Sandrine
Fachet, Katrin
Dinkel, Anke
Mackenstedt, Ute
Woog, Friederike
author_sort Schmid, Sandrine
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Avian malaria parasites (Plasmodium spp.) and other Haemosporida (Haemoproteus and Leucocytozoon spp.) form a diverse group of vector-transmitted blood parasites that are abundant in many bird families. Recent studies have suggested that corvids may be an important host for Plasmodium spp. and Leucocytozoon spp. METHODS: To investigate the diversity of Haemosporida of resident carrion crows (Corvus corone) and Eurasian Magpies (Pica pica) in southwest Germany, 100 liver samples of corvids were examined using a nested PCR method to amplify a 1063 bp fragment of the haemosporidian mitochondrial cytochrome b gene. The phylogenetic relationship of parasite lineages obtained from these birds was inferred. RESULTS: Haemosporidian DNA was detected in 85 carrion crows (89.5%) and in all five Eurasian Magpies. The most abundant parasite genus was Leucocytozoon with a prevalence of 85.3% (n = 95). 65.3% of the samples (n = 62) contained multiple infections. Thirteen haemosporidian lineages were isolated from the corvid samples. Female carrion crows were more likely infected with haemosporidian parasites than males. DISCUSSION: This study provides the first insight into the diversity of haemosporidian parasites of corvids in Germany. Very high prevalences were found and based on the applied diagnostic method also a high amount of multiple infections could be detected. Due to the high diversity of haemosporidian parasites found in corvids, they seem to be excellent model organisms to test species deliminations in haemosporidian parasites.
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spelling pubmed-55969622017-09-15 Carrion crows (Corvus corone) of southwest Germany: important hosts for haemosporidian parasites Schmid, Sandrine Fachet, Katrin Dinkel, Anke Mackenstedt, Ute Woog, Friederike Malar J Research BACKGROUND: Avian malaria parasites (Plasmodium spp.) and other Haemosporida (Haemoproteus and Leucocytozoon spp.) form a diverse group of vector-transmitted blood parasites that are abundant in many bird families. Recent studies have suggested that corvids may be an important host for Plasmodium spp. and Leucocytozoon spp. METHODS: To investigate the diversity of Haemosporida of resident carrion crows (Corvus corone) and Eurasian Magpies (Pica pica) in southwest Germany, 100 liver samples of corvids were examined using a nested PCR method to amplify a 1063 bp fragment of the haemosporidian mitochondrial cytochrome b gene. The phylogenetic relationship of parasite lineages obtained from these birds was inferred. RESULTS: Haemosporidian DNA was detected in 85 carrion crows (89.5%) and in all five Eurasian Magpies. The most abundant parasite genus was Leucocytozoon with a prevalence of 85.3% (n = 95). 65.3% of the samples (n = 62) contained multiple infections. Thirteen haemosporidian lineages were isolated from the corvid samples. Female carrion crows were more likely infected with haemosporidian parasites than males. DISCUSSION: This study provides the first insight into the diversity of haemosporidian parasites of corvids in Germany. Very high prevalences were found and based on the applied diagnostic method also a high amount of multiple infections could be detected. Due to the high diversity of haemosporidian parasites found in corvids, they seem to be excellent model organisms to test species deliminations in haemosporidian parasites. BioMed Central 2017-09-12 /pmc/articles/PMC5596962/ /pubmed/28899382 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12936-017-2023-5 Text en © The Author(s) 2017 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
spellingShingle Research
Schmid, Sandrine
Fachet, Katrin
Dinkel, Anke
Mackenstedt, Ute
Woog, Friederike
Carrion crows (Corvus corone) of southwest Germany: important hosts for haemosporidian parasites
title Carrion crows (Corvus corone) of southwest Germany: important hosts for haemosporidian parasites
title_full Carrion crows (Corvus corone) of southwest Germany: important hosts for haemosporidian parasites
title_fullStr Carrion crows (Corvus corone) of southwest Germany: important hosts for haemosporidian parasites
title_full_unstemmed Carrion crows (Corvus corone) of southwest Germany: important hosts for haemosporidian parasites
title_short Carrion crows (Corvus corone) of southwest Germany: important hosts for haemosporidian parasites
title_sort carrion crows (corvus corone) of southwest germany: important hosts for haemosporidian parasites
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5596962/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28899382
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12936-017-2023-5
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