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. 2020 Sep;51(3):1345-1351.
doi: 10.1007/s42770-020-00234-z. Epub 2020 Jan 30.

Longitudinal study of rotavirus C VP6 genotype I6 in diarrheic piglets up to 1 week old

Joice Elaine Teixeira Campanha  1 , Flávia Possatti  1 , Elis Lorenzetti  1   2   3 , Daniel de Almeida Moraes  1 , Alice Fernandes Alfieri  1   2 , Amauri Alcindo Alfieri  4   5
Affiliations

Longitudinal study of rotavirus C VP6 genotype I6 in diarrheic piglets up to 1 week old

Joice Elaine Teixeira Campanha et al. Braz J Microbiol. 2020 Sep.

Abstract

The reports of rotavirus C (RVC) involvement in diarrhea outbreaks in newborn piglets have been increasing in recent years. This longitudinal study, conducted over a 37-day period, aimed to evaluate the frequency of RVC infection in piglets aged up to 7 days obtained from a pig herd with a previous diagnosis of RVC infection in this age group. Piglets from 50 different litters were monitored daily for the occurrence of diarrhea, and all litters were classified into the following categories: sow parity order (PO) 1 to 5; litter size (LS) ≤ 10 piglets and > 10 piglets; and piglet birth weight (BW) 1.2 to 1.3 kg and > 1.3 to 1.4 kg. Two hundred six diarrheic fecal samples were collected and classified according to the fecal consistency score (pasty, semiliquid, liquid). Ten fecal samples were collected from asymptomatic piglets (control group). Fecal samples were screened for rotavirus (RV) by silver stained-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (ss-PAGE), and samples with inconclusive and negative-ss-PAGE results were submitted to RVC VP6 gene amplification by RT-PCR. RVC was identified in 71 (34.5%) samples, in 1 (10%) sample of the control group, and in piglets from 33 (66%) litters. The electrophoretic profile of RV species A was identified in only two samples. Of the 72 RVC-positive samples, 51 (70.8%) presented semiliquid or liquid consistency. There was no significant difference in either group regarding the production parameters (PO, LS, BW) evaluated. An analysis of the whole VP6 gene of three RVC field strains collected on the first, fifteenth, and last day of the experiment enabled us to identify genotype I6. This report describes the first longitudinal study examining epidemiological aspects of RVC infection in newborn piglets.

Keywords: Diarrhea; Epidemiology; Newborn; Pig; RVC.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Phylogenetic tree with 1128 bp amplicon (92–1219 nt) of the VP6 gene from Brazilian and other representative RVC strains of the genotypes. The tree was constructed using the neighbor-joining method and the Kimura 2-parameter model as a nucleotide substitution model. The percentages of bootstrap support are shown at each node. Bootstrap values lower than 45% are not shown. The sequence from this study is indicated by a filled circle
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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Supplementary concepts