Boundenga Larson, Ngoubangoye Barthélemy, Ntie Stephan, Moukodoum Nancy-Diamella, Renaud François, Rougeron Virginie, Prugnolle Franck
Centre International de Recherches Médicales de Franceville (CIRMF), BP. 769, Franceville, Gabon.
Laboratoire de Biologie Moléculaire et Cellulaire (LABMC), Département de Biologie, Université de Sciences et Techniques de Masuku (USTM), BP 941, Franceville, Gabon.
Int J Parasitol Parasites Wildl. 2019 Aug 4;10:117-124. doi: 10.1016/j.ijppaw.2019.07.010. eCollection 2019 Dec.
Malaria parasites infect a wide range of vertebrate hosts, such as reptiles, birds and mammals (i.e., primates, ungulates, bats, and rodents). Four species and their subspecies infect African Muridae. Since their discoveries in the 1940s, these rodent species have served as biological models to explore many aspects of the biology of malaria agents and their interactions with their hosts. Despite that, surprisingly, little is known about their ecology, natural history and evolution. Most field studies on these parasites, performed from the 1940s to the early 1980s, showed that all rodent species infect only one main host species, the thicket rat. In the present study, we re-explored the diversity of parasites infecting rodent species living in peridomestic habitats in Gabon, Central Africa. Using molecular approaches, we found that at least two species ( and ) circulated among five rodent species (including the invasive species ). This suggests that the host range of these parasites might be larger than previously considered. Our results also showed that the diversity of these parasites could be higher than currently recognized, with the discovery of a new phylogenetic lineage that could represent a new species of rodent .
疟原虫可感染多种脊椎动物宿主，如爬行动物、鸟类和哺乳动物（即灵长类动物、有蹄类动物、蝙蝠和啮齿动物）。有四种及其亚种感染非洲鼠科动物。自20世纪40年代被发现以来，这些啮齿动物物种一直作为生物学模型，用于探索疟原虫生物学的诸多方面及其与宿主的相互作用。尽管如此，令人惊讶的是，人们对它们的生态学、自然史和进化知之甚少。20世纪40年代至80年代初对这些寄生虫进行的大多数野外研究表明，所有啮齿动物物种仅感染一种主要宿主物种——灌丛鼠。在本研究中，我们重新探索了感染生活在中非加蓬居家周边栖息地啮齿动物物种的寄生虫多样性。通过分子方法，我们发现至少有两种（和）在五种啮齿动物物种（包括入侵物种）中传播。这表明这些寄生虫的宿主范围可能比之前认为的更广。我们的结果还表明，这些寄生虫的多样性可能比目前所认识到的更高，因为发现了一个新的系统发育谱系，可能代表一种新的啮齿动物疟原虫物种。
