Isolation, Identification, and Sequencing of a Goose-Derived Newcastle Disease Virus and Determination of Its Pathogenicity

• Published in: Avian diseases Vol. 59; no. 2; pp. 235 - 243
• Main Authors: Chen, Xiao-Qing, Li, Zi-Bing, Hu, Gui-Xue, Gu, Song-Zhi, Zhang, Shuang, Ying, Ying, Gao, Feng-Shan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States American Association of Avian Pathologists 01.06.2015
• Subjects: Animals; Anseriformes; Chick Embryo; Cloning, Molecular; Gene Expression Regulation, Viral - physiology; Newcastle Disease - virology; Newcastle disease virus - genetics; Newcastle disease virus - metabolism; Newcastle disease virus - pathogenicity; Phylogeny; Specific Pathogen-Free Organisms; Viral Proteins - genetics; Viral Proteins - metabolism; Virulence; China; genome; pathogenicity; isolation; geese; Newcastle disease virus
• ISSN: 1938-4351; 0005-2086; 1938-4351
• DOI: 10.1637/10957-100914-Reg

In August 2010, geese in the Meihekou area of Jilin province in China were found to be infected by a pathogen that caused a disease similar to Newcastle disease. To determine the causative agent of the infections, a virus was isolated from liver tissues of infected geese, followed by a pathogenicity determination. The isolated virus was named NDV/White Goose/China/Jilin(Meihekou)/MHK-1/2010. Specific primers were designed to amplify the whole genome of the MHK-1 virus, followed by sequencing and splicing of the entire genome. Sequencing and phylogenetic analysis of MHK-1 showed that the isolate was a virulent strain of Newcastle disease virus. The MHK-1 genome is 15,192 nucleotides long, and it belongs to the class II branch of Newcastle disease viruses, as evidenced by the amino acid sequence (¹¹²R-R-Q-K-R-F¹¹⁷) of the F protein. The hemagglutinin titer was 1:128 to 1:512. The chicken embryo mean death time, the intracerebral pathogenicity index, and the median lethal dose of chicken embryos of MHK-1 were 43 hr, 1.63, and 10⁹/ml, respectively, which revealed that the newly isolated MHK-1 strain is strongly pathogenic to geese.