Acevedo-Whitehouse Karina, Vicente Joaquín, Gortazar Christian, Höfle Ursula, Fernández-de-Mera Isabel G, Amos William
Laboratory of Molecular Ecology, Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3EJ, UK.
Mol Ecol. 2005 Sep;14(10):3209-17. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-294X.2005.02656.x.
Bovine tuberculosis (bTB) is an important re-emerging zoonotic disease, causing major economic losses and constraining international trade of animals and their products. Despite eradication programmes, some countries continue to encounter outbreaks, mainly due to wildlife acting as primary hosts or reservoirs. While the genetic component of tuberculosis in humans and cattle is well documented, the role of genetic factors as modulators of bTB resistance remains unclear for natural populations. To address this issue, we investigated the relative contribution of host genetic variability to susceptibility to bTB infection and disease progression in wild boars from southern Spain. We found that genetic heterozygosity is an important predictor of bTB, not only modulating resistance to infection but also influencing containment of disease progression in infected individuals. Our results provide further evidence that host genetic variability plays a central role in natural populations. Testing each marker separately reveals evidence of both general and single-locus associative effects on bTB and several loci reveal high homology to regions of the genome with known immune function. Our results may prove to be crucial for understanding outbreaks of bTB in wildlife that could potentially affect domestic livestock and humans.
牛结核病（bTB）是一种重要的再度出现的人畜共患病，会造成重大经济损失，并限制动物及其产品的国际贸易。尽管实施了根除计划，但一些国家仍不断遭遇疫情爆发，主要原因是野生动物充当了主要宿主或储存宿主。虽然人类和牛结核病的遗传成分已有充分记录，但对于自然种群而言，遗传因素作为牛结核病抗性调节因子的作用仍不清楚。为解决这一问题，我们调查了宿主遗传变异性对西班牙南部野猪感染牛结核病及疾病进展易感性的相对贡献。我们发现，遗传杂合性是牛结核病的一个重要预测指标，不仅能调节对感染的抗性，还能影响感染个体疾病进展的控制。我们的结果进一步证明，宿主遗传变异性在自然种群中起着核心作用。分别测试每个标记揭示了对牛结核病的一般和单基因座关联效应的证据，并且几个基因座与具有已知免疫功能的基因组区域显示出高度同源性。我们的结果可能对于理解可能影响家畜和人类的野生动物牛结核病疫情爆发至关重要。
