BACKGROUND The majority of emerging infectious diseases are zoonotic in nature and originate from wildlife reservoirs. Borna disease, caused by Borna disease virus 1 (BoDV-1), is an infectious disease affecting mammals, but recently it has also been shown to cause fatal encephalitis in humans. The endemic character of Borna disease points towards a nature-bound reservoir, with only one shrew species identified as reservoir host to date. Bats have been identified as reservoirs of a variety of zoonotic infectious agents. Endogenous borna-like elements in the genome of certain bat species additionally point towards co-evolution of bats with bornaviruses and therefore raise the question whether bats could serve as a potential reservoir of orthobornaviruses. METHODS Frozen brain samples (n = 257) of bats of seven different genera from Germany were investigated by orthobornaviral RT-PCR. Additionally, tissue slides of formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded material of a subset of these bats (n = 140) were investigated for orthobornaviral phosphoprotein by immunohistochemistry. RESULTS The brain samples were tested by RT-PCR without any evidence of orthobornavirus specific amplicons. Immunohistochemistry revealed a faint immunoreaction in 3/140 bats but with an untypical staining pattern for viral antigen. CONCLUSIONS RT-PCR-screening showed no evidence for orthobornaviral RNA in the investigated bats. However, immunohistochemistry results should be investigated further to elucidate whether the reaction might be associated with expressed endogenous bornaviral elements or other so far unknown bornaviruses.

中文翻译：

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没有证据表明欧洲蝙蝠是博尔纳病病毒 1 或其他已知哺乳动物正博尔纳病毒的宿主。


背景技术大多数新出现的传染病本质上是人畜共患的并且源自野生动物宿主。博尔纳病由博尔纳病病毒 1 (BoDV-1) 引起，是一种影响哺乳动物的传染病，但最近也被证明可引起人类致命的脑炎。博尔纳病的地方性特征表明它是一种自然宿主，迄今为止，只有一种鼩鼱物种被确定为宿主。蝙蝠已被确定为多种人畜共患传染病的宿主。某些蝙蝠物种基因组中的内源性博纳样元件还表明蝙蝠与博纳病毒共同进化，因此提出了蝙蝠是否可以作为正博纳病毒潜在储存库的问题。方法 通过正博尔病毒 RT-PCR 对来自德国的 7 个不同属的蝙蝠的冷冻大脑样本（n = 257）进行了研究。此外，通过免疫组织化学研究了这些蝙蝠子集（n = 140）的福尔马林固定石蜡包埋材料的组织切片中的正博尔病毒磷蛋白。结果 通过 RT-PCR 检测大脑样本，没有发现任何正博尔纳病毒特异性扩增子的证据。免疫组织化学显示 3/140 只蝙蝠中有微弱的免疫反应，但病毒抗原的染色模式不典型。结论 RT-PCR 筛查显示，所研究的蝙蝠中没有证据表明存在正博尔病毒 RNA。然而，应进一步研究免疫组织化学结果，以阐明该反应是否可能与表达的内源性博纳病毒元件或其他迄今为止未知的博纳病毒有关。