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Metavirome of 31 tick species provides a compendium of 1,801 RNA virus genomes.

Xue-Bing NiXiao-Ming CuiJin-Yue LiuRun-Ze YeYu-Qian WuJia-Fu JiangYi SunQian WangMarcus Ho-Hin ShumQiao-Cheng ChangLin ZhaoXiao-Hu HanKe MaShi-Jing ShenMing-Zhu ZhangWen-Bin GuoJin-Guo ZhuLin ZhanLiang-Jing LiShu-Jun DingDai-Yun ZhuJie ZhangLuo-Yuan XiaXiang-Yong OongXiang-Dong RuanHong-Ze ShaoTeng-Cheng QueGuang-Yuan LiuChun-Hong DuEn-Jiong HuangXin WangLi-Feng DuChong-Cai WangWen-Qiang ShiYu-Sheng PanYu-Hao ZhouJiang-Li QuJiang MaCai-Wei GongQi-Qing ChenQian Qinnull nullTommy Tsan-Yuk LamNa JiaWu-Chun Cao
Published in: Nature microbiology (2023)
The increasing prevalence and expanding distribution of tick-borne viruses globally have raised health concerns, but the full repertoire of the tick virome has not been assessed. We sequenced the meta-transcriptomes of 31 different tick species in the Ixodidae and Argasidae families from across mainland China, and identified 724 RNA viruses with distinctive virome compositions among genera. A total of 1,801 assembled and complete or nearly complete viral genomes revealed an extensive diversity of genome architectures of tick-associated viruses, highlighting ticks as a reservoir of RNA viruses. We examined the phylogenies of different virus families to investigate virome evolution and found that the most diverse tick-associated viruses are positive-strand RNA virus families that demonstrate more ancient divergence than other arboviruses. Tick-specific viruses are often associated with only a few tick species, whereas virus clades that can infect vertebrates are found in a wider range of tick species. We hypothesize that tick viruses can exhibit both 'specialist' and 'generalist' evolutionary trends. We hope that our virome dataset will enable much-needed research on vertebrate-pathogenic tick-associated viruses.
Keyphrases
  • genetic diversity
  • healthcare
  • public health
  • gene expression
  • single cell
  • dna methylation
  • disease virus