US scientists use new technique to discover new viruses in poultry
summary：Scientists at the US Department of Agriculture (USDA have used a new technique, known metagenomics, to discover new viruses in poultry....
The new molecular tool detects the nucleic acid of thousands of organisms in an entire community, unlike traditional sequencing that characterizes genes in a single organism.
For the study, researchers from Agricultural Research Service (ARS) - the chief intramural scientific research agency of USDA, used metagenomics to analyze nucleic acid from poultry intestine samples gathered from US commercial poultry flocks infected with enteric diseases.
The researchers were able to identify a new virus called "phiCA82" in turkeys that potentially could be used as an alternative to antibiotics to fight multi-drug-resistant pathogens in poultry. They also identified common avian viruses like astrovirus, reovirus and rotavirus, and RNA viruses belonging to the Picornaviridae family.
In addition, they discovered previously unknown turkey viruses like picobirnavirus, a virus implicated in enteric disease in other agricultural animals, and a calicivirus, a type of virus often associated with human enteric diseases.