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Pacific Gulls (Larus pacificus) as Potential Vectors of Coxiella burnetii in an Australian Fur Seal Breeding Colony

Recently, Coxiella burnetii has been described as a novel pathogen potentially contributing to decreased pup production in Australian fur seals (AusFS, Arctocephalus pusillus doriferus). Pacific gulls (PGs, Larus pacificus) are known to scavenge AusFS placental material during the fur seal breeding...

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Autores principales: Gardner, Brett R., Hufschmid, Jasmin, Stenos, John, Tadepalli, Mythili, Sutton, Grace, Fromant, Aymeric, Eizenberg, Yonina, Geeson, Johanna J., Arnould, John P. Y.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9864253/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36678470
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/pathogens12010122
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author Gardner, Brett R.
Hufschmid, Jasmin
Stenos, John
Tadepalli, Mythili
Sutton, Grace
Fromant, Aymeric
Eizenberg, Yonina
Geeson, Johanna J.
Arnould, John P. Y.
author_facet Gardner, Brett R.
Hufschmid, Jasmin
Stenos, John
Tadepalli, Mythili
Sutton, Grace
Fromant, Aymeric
Eizenberg, Yonina
Geeson, Johanna J.
Arnould, John P. Y.
author_sort Gardner, Brett R.
collection PubMed
description Recently, Coxiella burnetii has been described as a novel pathogen potentially contributing to decreased pup production in Australian fur seals (AusFS, Arctocephalus pusillus doriferus). Pacific gulls (PGs, Larus pacificus) are known to scavenge AusFS placental material during the fur seal breeding season. It is hypothesized that PGs may act as vectors for this pathogen. In the present study, cloacal swabs, oral swabs and serum were collected from PGs on Kanowna Island (KI, an AusFS breeding colony) and a nearby island, Seal Island (SI), not occupied by pinnipeds. All sample sets were evaluated with qPCR for the com1, htpAB and IS1111 markers. Most oral and cloacal swabs from KI tested positive on both the com1 (94.1%; 88.2%) and htpAB targets (76.5%; 76.5%). Amplification was very low from the SI oral swabs and cloacal swabs. Only the KI serum samples had amplification (17.7% for both com1 and htpAB). There was no IS1111 amplification in either colony. The results demonstrate that PGs can potentially act as vectors for the spread of C. burnetii. In some birds, C. burnetii was detectable in the serum, indicating that gulls can experience bacteraemia. It appears that different feeding strategies in the same species within the same ecosystem can have profound effects on the prevalence of pathogens. Further studies are required to better understand the epidemiology and potential risks of this organism.
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spelling pubmed-98642532023-01-22 Pacific Gulls (Larus pacificus) as Potential Vectors of Coxiella burnetii in an Australian Fur Seal Breeding Colony Gardner, Brett R. Hufschmid, Jasmin Stenos, John Tadepalli, Mythili Sutton, Grace Fromant, Aymeric Eizenberg, Yonina Geeson, Johanna J. Arnould, John P. Y. Pathogens Article Recently, Coxiella burnetii has been described as a novel pathogen potentially contributing to decreased pup production in Australian fur seals (AusFS, Arctocephalus pusillus doriferus). Pacific gulls (PGs, Larus pacificus) are known to scavenge AusFS placental material during the fur seal breeding season. It is hypothesized that PGs may act as vectors for this pathogen. In the present study, cloacal swabs, oral swabs and serum were collected from PGs on Kanowna Island (KI, an AusFS breeding colony) and a nearby island, Seal Island (SI), not occupied by pinnipeds. All sample sets were evaluated with qPCR for the com1, htpAB and IS1111 markers. Most oral and cloacal swabs from KI tested positive on both the com1 (94.1%; 88.2%) and htpAB targets (76.5%; 76.5%). Amplification was very low from the SI oral swabs and cloacal swabs. Only the KI serum samples had amplification (17.7% for both com1 and htpAB). There was no IS1111 amplification in either colony. The results demonstrate that PGs can potentially act as vectors for the spread of C. burnetii. In some birds, C. burnetii was detectable in the serum, indicating that gulls can experience bacteraemia. It appears that different feeding strategies in the same species within the same ecosystem can have profound effects on the prevalence of pathogens. Further studies are required to better understand the epidemiology and potential risks of this organism. MDPI 2023-01-11 /pmc/articles/PMC9864253/ /pubmed/36678470 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/pathogens12010122 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Gardner, Brett R.
Hufschmid, Jasmin
Stenos, John
Tadepalli, Mythili
Sutton, Grace
Fromant, Aymeric
Eizenberg, Yonina
Geeson, Johanna J.
Arnould, John P. Y.
Pacific Gulls (Larus pacificus) as Potential Vectors of Coxiella burnetii in an Australian Fur Seal Breeding Colony
title Pacific Gulls (Larus pacificus) as Potential Vectors of Coxiella burnetii in an Australian Fur Seal Breeding Colony
title_full Pacific Gulls (Larus pacificus) as Potential Vectors of Coxiella burnetii in an Australian Fur Seal Breeding Colony
title_fullStr Pacific Gulls (Larus pacificus) as Potential Vectors of Coxiella burnetii in an Australian Fur Seal Breeding Colony
title_full_unstemmed Pacific Gulls (Larus pacificus) as Potential Vectors of Coxiella burnetii in an Australian Fur Seal Breeding Colony
title_short Pacific Gulls (Larus pacificus) as Potential Vectors of Coxiella burnetii in an Australian Fur Seal Breeding Colony
title_sort pacific gulls (larus pacificus) as potential vectors of coxiella burnetii in an australian fur seal breeding colony
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9864253/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36678470
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/pathogens12010122
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