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. 2025 Jun 6;25(1):355.
doi: 10.1186/s12866-025-04059-4.

High throughput screening for human disease associated-pathogens and antimicrobial resistance genes in migratory birds at ten habitat sites in China

Lan Wang  1 , Ru Jia  2 , Rufei Ma  1 , Jie Li  1 , Shanrui Wu  1 , Yeshun Fan  1 , Dan Zhao  1 , Dianfeng Chu  3 , Yihua Wang  2 , Guogang Zhang  2 , Jie Liu  4
Affiliations

High throughput screening for human disease associated-pathogens and antimicrobial resistance genes in migratory birds at ten habitat sites in China

Lan Wang et al. BMC Microbiol. .

Abstract

Background: Migratory birds have been found to carry and spread pathogens, contaminating the environment and causing diseases in humans and other animals. To our knowledge, there hasn't been any systematic targeted screening for known pathogens in migratory birds. In the current study, customized real time PCR based TaqMan Array Cards (TAC) were used to detect 99 human disease related pathogens and 20 antimicrobial resistance (AMR) genes in migratory birds at 10 habitat sites in China.

Results: The results showed that 30.5% (107/351) of migratory birds carried at least one of 14 pathogens. The most prevalent pathogens included Aeromonas, Plasmodium, Cryptosporidium, Giardia lamblia, enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC), Campylobacter jejuni/coli, and Rickettsia. Their distribution demonstrated certain host or region specificity. Anseriformes carried higher rate of pathogens (39.1%, 72/184) than Charadriiformes (23.2%, 33/142, p < 0.05). The overall pathogen detection rate was the highest in Hubei (87.1%, 27/31), possessing exclusively Anser. The pathogen quantities were estimated to be 103 to 2 × 108 gene copies per gram of feces. AMR genes associated with resistance to macrolides, quinolones, tetracyclines, and β-lactams were widely detected, with overall quantities ranging from 105 to 109 copies of interrogated genes for each drug class per gram of feces.

Conclusions: Using such a multi-target detection and quantification platform, this study evaluated the potential role of migratory birds as reservoirs or vectors for a broad range of pathogens and AMR genes in the environment, indicating their capacity to transmit zoonotic diseases. These might provide evidence for implementation of targeted intervention with a one health approach.

Keywords: Antimicrobial resistance; Migratory birds; Pathogen; Surveillance; TaqMan Array Card.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Ethics approval and consent to participate: The study was approved by the Ethics Committee of Medical College of Qingdao University (QDU-AEC-2024388). Consent for publication: Not applicable. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Distribution of the detected pathogens in the different migratory bird orders
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Distribution of pathogens detected in Anser by season
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Pathogen quantities in the fecal samples of migratory birds determined by qPCR. The quantity was expressed as the copy number of gene per gram of feces
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Averaged quantities of AMR genes detected in Anseriformes and Charadriifornes. The quantity of each gene was averaged among all the samples tested regardless of positivity for the relevant gene. The total quantity indicates the sum of the averaged quantities of the genes belonging to the same drug class
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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