First Description of a Carnivore Protoparvovirus Associated with a Clinical Case in the Iberian Lynx (Lynx pardinus)

Abstract

One of the main threats for the survival of the Iberian lynx is infectious disease. Feline parvoviruses cause often fatal diseases in cats and have been isolated from different species of Felidae and other carnivores. The present study is the first description of a parvoviral sequence isolated from the brain of an Iberian lynx which died four weeks after being transferred to a quarantine centre from a hunting estate in Castilla-La-Mancha (southern border of the Iberian plateau). Four days prior to death, it had developed anorexia and muscle weakness. The nucleotide sequence, at 4589 nt long (GenBank PP781551), was most proximal to that isolated from a Eurasian badger in Italy but also showed great homology with others from cats and other carnivores isolated in Spain and Italy, including that from a cat sequenced by us to elucidate the origin of the infection, which has not been clarified. The phylogenetic analysis of the capsid protein, VP2, which determines tropism and host range, confirmed that the lynx sequence was most proximal to feline than to canine parvoviruses, and was thus typed as Protoparvovirus carnivoran1. More studies, including serology, are needed to understand the pathogenesis of this infection.

Keywords: FPV; Iberian lynx; PCR; complete sequence; faeces; parvovirus.

Figure 1

Geographic position of the hunting estate (A), Recovery Centre “El Chaparrillo”, Ciudad Real (B) and Madrid (C) (http://google.com/maps). The regions of Andalusia, Extremadura, Catalonia and Navarra, mentioned in the text, are also shown.

Figure 2

Strategy of nested PCRs used for sequencing the complete genome of Protoparvovirus carnivoran1 from lynx (LG100), cat (LG15) and dog (LG151). The thin line on top represents the parvoviral genome. The thick lines represent external PCRs, while the thinner ones with shadow represent internal PCRs. The exact position of each primer is shown in Supplementary Table S2.

Figure 3

Necropsy findings of the affected Iberian lynx. (A) The body condition of the lynx was judged as 1.5 on a scale of 1–5. (B) Congestion of the submucosal vessels and haemorrhagic enteritis. (C) Presence of congestion in the heart. (D) Kidney congestion. (E) Hepatomegaly and hepatic congestion. (F) Congestion and enlargement of the mesenteric lymph node. (G) Congestion of the encephalic vessels.

Figure 4

Phylogenetic tree based on the amino acid sequences of the full-length VP2 protein from Spanish strains sequenced in this study (indicated in red) and other strains (shown by GenBank accession number, host species and country of isolation). Blue box, strains typed as CPV. Pink box, strains typed as FPV.