1. Variation in predicted COVID-19 risk among lemurs and lorises
- Author
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Melin, Amanda D., Orkin, Joseph D., Janiak, Mareike C., Valenzuela, Alejandro, Kuderna, Lukas F. K., Marrone, Frank, Ramangason, Hasinala, Horvath, Julie E., Roos, Christian, Kitchener, Andrew C., Khor, Chiea Chuen, Lim, Weng Khong, Lee, Jessica G. H., Tan, Patrick, Umapathy, Govindhaswamy, Raveendran, Muthuswamy, Harris, R. Alan, Gut, Ivo, Gut, Marta, Lizano, Esther, Nadler, Tilo, Zinner, Dietmar, Johnson, Steig E., Jarvis, Erich D., Fedrigo, Olivier, Wu, Dongdong, Zhang, Guojie, Farh, Kyle Kai-How, Rogers, Jeffrey, Marqués-Bonet, Tomàs, Navarro, Arcadi, Juan, David, Arora, Paramjit S., Higham, James P., Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, Canada Research Chairs, Natural Environment Research Council (UK), Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad (España), Instituto de Salud Carlos III, European Commission, Generalitat de Catalunya, European Research Council, Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades (España), Agencia Estatal de Investigación (España), Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Fundación 'la Caixa', Melin, Amanda D. [0000-0002-0612-2514], Orkin, Joseph D. [0000-0001-6922-2072], Janiak, Mareike C. [0000-0002-7759-2556], Kuderna, Lukas F. K. [0000-0002-9992-9295], Marrone, Frank [0000-0002-1735-0723], Arora, Paramjit S. [0000-0001-5315-401X], Higham, James P. [0000-0002-1133-2030], Melin, Amanda D., Orkin, Joseph D., Janiak, Mareike C., Kuderna, Lukas F. K., Marrone, Frank, Arora, Paramjit S., and Higham, James P.
- Abstract
Versión editorial disponible en: http://hdl.handle.net/10261/239013, The novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, which in humans leads to the disease COVID-19, has caused global disruption and more than 1.5 million fatalities since it first emerged in late 2019. As we write, infection rates are currently at their highest point globally and are rising extremely rapidly in some areas due to more infectious variants. The primary viral target is the cellular receptor angiotensin-converting enzyme2 (ACE2). Recent sequence analyses of the ACE2 gene predicts that many nonhuman primates are also likely to be highly susceptible to infection. However, the anticipated risk is not equal across the Order. Furthermore, some taxonomic groups show high ACE2 amino acid conservation, while others exhibit high variability at this locus. As an example of the latter, analyses of strepsirrhine primate ACE2 sequences to date indicate large variation among lemurs and lorises compared to other primate clades despite low sampling effort. Here, we report ACE2 gene and protein sequences for 71 individual strepsirrhines, spanning 51 species and 19 genera. Our study reinforces previous results and finds additional variability in other strepsirrhine species, and suggests several clades of lemurs have high potential susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 infection. Troublingly, some species, including the rare and Endangered aye-aye (Daubentonia madagascariensis), as well as those in the genera Avahi and Propithecus, may be at high risk. Given that lemurs are endemic to Madagascar and among the primates at highest risk of extinction globally, further understanding of the potential threat of COVID-19 to their health should be a conservation priority. All feasible actions should be taken to limit their exposure to SARS-CoV-2., ADM is supported by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC Discovery Grant) and Canada Research Chairs Program. MCJ’s postdoctoral appointment is supported by funding from the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC NE/T000341/1). IG and MG acknowledge the support of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the Instituto de Salud Carlos III and the 2014–2020 Smart Growth Operating Program, to the EMBL partnership and cofinancing with the European Regional Development Fund (MINECO/FEDER, BIO2015-71792-P). We also acknowledge the support of the Centro de Excelencia Severo Ochoa, and the Generalitat de Catalunya through the Departament de Salut, Departament d’Empresa i Coneixement and the CERCA Programme. TMB is supported by funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (grant agreement No. 864203), BFU2017-86471-P (MINECO/FEDER, UE), “Unidad de Excelencia María de Maeztu”, funded by the AEI (CEX2018-000792-M), Howard Hughes International Early Career, Obra Social "La Caixa" and Secretaria d’Universitats i Recerca and CERCA Programme del Departament d’Economia i Coneixement de la Generalitat de Catalunya (GRC 2017 SGR 880). PSA thanks the National Institutes of Health (R35GM130333) for financial support. E.L is supported by CGL2017- 82654-P (MINECO/FEDER,UE). EDJ and OF's contributions were supported by funds from Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the Rockefeller University. Chris Smith drew the images for Figure 1. The authors would like to thank the Veterinary and Zoology staff at Wildlife Reserves Singapore for their help in obtaining the tissue samples, as well as the Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum for storage and provision of the tissue samples.
- Published
- 2021