Department of Microbiology and Immunology, School of Medicine, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA.
Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA.
mBio. 2017 Dec 5;8(6):e01339-17. doi: 10.1128/mBio.01339-17.
is a pathogenic fungus that causes life-threatening lung infections. About 500,000 people are exposed to each year in the United States, and over 60% of the U.S. population has been exposed to the fungus at some point in their life. We performed genome-wide population genetics and phylogenetic analyses with 30 isolates representing four recognized areas where histoplasmosis is endemic and show that the genus is composed of at least four species that are genetically isolated and rarely interbreed. Therefore, we propose a taxonomic rearrangement of the genus. The evolutionary processes that give rise to new pathogen lineages are critical to our understanding of how they adapt to new environments and how frequently they exchange genes with each other. The fungal pathogen provides opportunities to precisely test hypotheses about the origin of new genetic variation. We find that is composed of at least four different cryptic species that differ genetically and also in virulence. These results have implications for the epidemiology of histoplasmosis because not all species are equivalent in their geographic range and ability to cause disease.
是一种致病真菌，可引起危及生命的肺部感染。在美国，每年约有 50 万人接触到这种真菌，超过 60%的美国人口在其一生中的某个时刻曾接触过这种真菌。我们对代表四个公认的地方性荚膜组织胞浆菌病地区的 30 个分离株进行了全基因组种群遗传学和系统发育分析，结果表明，该属至少由四个种组成，它们在遗传上是隔离的，很少杂交。因此，我们提出了该属的分类重排。产生新病原体谱系的进化过程对于我们理解它们如何适应新环境以及它们彼此之间交换基因的频率至关重要。真菌病原体为精确检验关于新遗传变异起源的假说提供了机会。我们发现，由至少四个不同的隐性种组成，它们在遗传上和毒力上都有所不同。这些结果对荚膜组织胞浆菌病的流行病学有影响，因为并非所有的种在地理分布范围和引起疾病的能力方面都是等同的。
