Science Daily reports on pilot whales and orcas in the Caribbean which DNA analysis has revealed are carrying “invisible” viruses we’ve never detected before:
The group includes students and senior scientists from Arizona State University (ASU), Coastal Carolina University, The University of the South in the US, as well as researchers in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, The University of the West Indies at Cave Hill (Barbados), University of Cape Town (South Africa), and Institut Pasteur (France). This marks the first time circoviruses have been detected in cetaceans from this region and adds to the growing list of viruses known to infect marine vertebrates.
The findings come from a study titled “Novel circoviruses identified in short-finned pilot whale and orca from the North Atlantic Ocean,” led by Arvind Varsani, a virologist at ASU’s School of Life Sciences and Biodesign Institute. The study’s first author is Matthew De Koch. Researchers used high-throughput genetic sequencing to analyze archived tissue samples taken from deceased whales. These samples were collected through long-standing collaborations between Russell Fielding (Coastal Carolina University) and artisanal subsistence whalers on the island of St. Vincent.
From this analysis, scientists recovered seven complete circovirus genomes. Five of the genomes came from short-finned pilot whales, while two were found in orcas. The viruses represent two entirely new species, which the researchers named shofin circovirus and orcin circovirus. Both are clearly different from the only cetacean circovirus previously known, beaked whale circovirus, which was identified earlier in a stranded whale from the Pacific Ocean.