PLoS ONE (Jan 2020)

Viral DNA genomes in sera of farrowing sows with or without stillbirths.

  • Caroline Tochetto,
  • Ana Paula Muterle Varela,
  • Diane Alves de Lima,
  • Márcia Regina Loiko,
  • Camila Mengue Scheffer,
  • Willian Pinto Paim,
  • Cristine Cerva,
  • Candice Schmidt,
  • Samuel Paulo Cibulski,
  • Lucía Cano Ortiz,
  • Sidia Maria Callegari Jacques,
  • Ana Cláudia Franco,
  • Fabiana Quoos Mayer,
  • Paulo Michel Roehe

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0230714
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 15, no. 3
p. e0230714

Abstract

Read online

A study was conducted to investigate the serum virome of sows with and without stillbirths after farrowing. Sera from sows with at least one stillbirth or with normal litters were collected immediately after farrowing. Viral DNA was extracted from serum pools and submitted to high throughput sequencing. No differences in the proportion of virus-related reads were found in both groups (p > 0.05). A variety of viral DNA genomes were identified, mostly representative of three viral families: Anelloviridae, Circoviridae and Smacoviridae. Besides, a number of novel unclassified circular Rep-encoding single stranded DNA (CRESS DNA) viruses were also identified. These findings suggest that the presence of such viral genomes in sows' sera bears no correlation with stillbirths' occurrence; it seems likely that these constitute part of the normal serum microbiome of sows at farrowing.