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Molecular characterization of a novel reassortant H7N6 subtype avian influenza virus from poultry in Eastern China, in 2016

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Abstract

During the surveillance for avian influenza viruses (AIVs) in live poultry markets in Eastern China, in 2016, a novel reassortant H7N6 AIV was isolated from a chicken. Phylogenetic analysis showed that this strain received its genes from H9N2, H7N9 and H5N6 AIVs infecting poultry in China. This strain showed moderate pathogenicity in mice and was able to replicate in mice without prior adaptation. Considering that this novel reassorted H7N6 virus was isolated from poultry in this study, it is possible that chickens play an important role in the generation of novel reassorted H7N6 AIVs.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Diseases, Collaborative Innovation Center for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Diseases, The First Affiliated Hospital, School of Medicine, Zhejiang University, 79 Qingchun Road, Hangzhou, 310003, Zhejiang, China

    Haibo Wu, Xiuming Peng, Xiaorong Peng, Bin Chen, Linfang Cheng & Nanping Wu

  2. Department of Emergency, The First Affiliated Hospital of Zhejiang Chinese Medical University, Hangzhou, 310006, China

    Rufeng Lu

Authors
  1. Haibo Wu
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  2. Rufeng Lu
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  3. Xiuming Peng
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  4. Xiaorong Peng
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  5. Bin Chen
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  6. Linfang Cheng
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  7. Nanping Wu
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Nanping Wu.

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Funding

This study was funded by grants from the National Science Foundation of the People’s Republic of China (81502852), Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (Y15H190006) and the Independent Task of State Key Laboratory for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Diseases (Nos. 2015ZZ05 and 2016ZZ03).

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they had no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

The animal experiments were approved by the First Affiliated Hospital, School of Medicine, Zhejiang University (No. 2015-15).

Electronic supplementary material

Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.

705_2017_3219_MOESM1_ESM.doc

Figure S1. Phylogenetic trees of PB2 (positions 1-2280), PB1 (positions 1-2274), PA (positions 1-2151), NP (positions 1-1497), M (positions 1-959), and NS (positions 1-838) genes of the novel reassortant H7N6 avian influenza virus. The tree was created by the maximum likelihood method and bootstrapped with 1,000 replicates, using the MEGA software version 6.0. The H7N6 virus characterized is indicated by a triangle, and other subtypes avian influenza viruses, H5N2 (n=4), H6N6 (n=1) and H9N2 (n=1), which were isolated in this study, are indicated by a dot. The scale bar represents the distance unit between sequence pairs (DOC 713 kb)

705_2017_3219_MOESM2_ESM.pdf

Figure S2. Comparison of deduced amino acid sequences of HA using MegAlign program. Identical amino acids are shown as dots. The blue box represents HA sequence at the cleavage site, black boxes represent potential N-linked glycosylation sites, red/yellow boxes indicates residues involved in the receptor binding site (PDF 144 kb)

705_2017_3219_MOESM3_ESM.doc

Figure S3. Weight variation of BABL/c mice infected with the novel H7N6 avian influenza virus. Each mouse in a group was infected intranasally with 106 EID50 of H7N6 virus in a volume of 0.05 ml. The body weight of mice was measured daily from the date of challenge to 14 days after challenge (DOC 76 kb)

Supplementary material 4 (DOCX 13 kb)

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Wu, H., Lu, R., Peng, X. et al. Molecular characterization of a novel reassortant H7N6 subtype avian influenza virus from poultry in Eastern China, in 2016. Arch Virol 162, 1341–1347 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00705-017-3219-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00705-017-3219-2

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