Molecular and serological evidence for the presence of novel phleboviruses in sandflies from northern algeria

Abstract

During summer 2007, a total of 785 phlebotomine flies were trapped in northern Algeria, identified morphologically, organised as monospecific pools and tested for the presence of phlebovirus RNA using degenerate primers. Three pools were positive, and the corresponding PCR products were cloned and sequenced. Viral sequences corresponding to two phleboviruses distinct from each other were detected in sandflies circulating in two close locations (140 km apart) in Northern Algeria. The 3 sequences were aligned with homologous polymerase sequences retrieved from the Genbank database, in order to examine their phylogenetic relationships. One viral sequence (from Phlebotomus papatasi) was closely related to but distinct from a sequence obtained from Phlebotomus ariasi sandflies trapped in Algeria in 2006. The two other viral sequences (from Phlebotomus longicuspis) were genetically distantly related to sequences corresponding to virus members of the Sandfly fever Naples virus species and although falling within the same group, this clearly represents a second distinct novel lineage. These results are indicative of a high genetic heterogeneity within sandflies trapped in a relatively small geographic area. Seroprevalence studies conducted on sera from populations living in the same areas indicated that humans can be infected by these viruses.

Keywords: Punique virus; Toscana virus; emergence; mediterranean.; sandfly fever Naples virus; sandfly fever sicilian virus.

Fig. (1)

Geographic Trapping locations in Algeria.

Fig. (2)

Phylogenetic analysis of phlebovirus sequences obtained from Algerian sandflies based on 67-AA sequence representing a section of the polymerase gene. Distances and groupings were determined by the pairwise or kimura-2 algorithm and neighbor-joining method within MEGA 4.0 [20]. Bootstrap values corresponding to 1000 replications are indicated. Sequences determined in this study are bolded.