Figures
New hantaviruses found in China challenge the conventional view that they originated in rodents.
Hantaviruses are the etiological agent(s) of hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome (HFRS) and hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS) in humans. Four new forms of hantavirus have been identified in bats and insectivores in China (see Guo et al., doi:10.1371/journal.ppat.1003159). The study suggests hantaviruses first appeared in bats before spreading to rodents, challenging the conventional view that they originated in rodents. Picture shows the gregarious hibernating bats in a cave, in which Longquan virus was found.
Image Credit: Yong–Zhen Zhang, National Institute for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention, Chinese CDC
Citation: (2013) PLoS Pathogens Issue Image | Vol. 9(2) February 2013. PLoS Pathog 9(2): ev09.i02. https://doi.org/10.1371/image.ppat.v09.i02
Published: February 28, 2013
Copyright: © 2013 Zhang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Hantaviruses are the etiological agent(s) of hemorrhagic fever with renal syndrome (HFRS) and hantavirus pulmonary syndrome (HPS) in humans. Four new forms of hantavirus have been identified in bats and insectivores in China (see Guo et al., doi:10.1371/journal.ppat.1003159). The study suggests hantaviruses first appeared in bats before spreading to rodents, challenging the conventional view that they originated in rodents. Picture shows the gregarious hibernating bats in a cave, in which Longquan virus was found.
Image Credit: Yong–Zhen Zhang, National Institute for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention, Chinese CDC