Bluetongue virus spread in Europe is a consequence of climatic, landscape and vertebrate host factors as revealed by phylogeographic inference.

ABSTRACT: Spatio-temporal patterns of the spread of infectious diseases are commonly driven by environmental and ecological factors. This is particularly true for vector-borne diseases because vector populations can be strongly affected by host distribution as well as by climatic and landscape variables. Here, we aim to identify environmental drivers for bluetongue virus (BTV), the causative agent of a major vector-borne disease of ruminants that has emerged multiple times in Europe in recent decades. In order to determine the importance of climatic, landscape and host-related factors affecting BTV diffusion across Europe, we fitted different phylogeographic models to a dataset of 113 time-stamped and geo-referenced BTV genomes, representing multiple strains and serotypes. Diffusion models using con

SUBMITTER: Jacquot M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5647287 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature