Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/1893/33519
Appears in Collections:Aquaculture Journal Articles
Peer Review Status: Refereed
Title: Presence of DNA from Chlamydia-like organisms in the nasal cavities of grey seal pups (Halichoerus grypus) and three different substrates present in a breeding colony
Author(s): Dagleish, Mark
Flockhart, Allen
Baily, Johanna
Hall, Ailsa
Simpson, T. Ian
Longbottom, David
Keywords: Chlamydia-like organisms
Parachlamydiaceae
Rhabdochlamydiaceae
Simkaniaceae
sentinel species
coastal reservoir
Issue Date: Dec-2021
Date Deposited: 27-Oct-2021
Citation: Dagleish M, Flockhart A, Baily J, Hall A, Simpson TI & Longbottom D (2021) Presence of DNA from Chlamydia-like organisms in the nasal cavities of grey seal pups (Halichoerus grypus) and three different substrates present in a breeding colony. BMC Veterinary Research, 17 (1), Art. No.: 328. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12917-021-03032-3
Abstract: Background Chlamydia-like organisms (CLO) have been found to be present in many environmental niches, including human sewage and agricultural run-off, as well as in a number of aquatic species worldwide. Therefore, monitoring their presence in sentinel wildlife species may be useful in assessing the wider health of marine food webs in response to habitat loss, pollution and disease. We used nasal swabs from live (n = 42) and dead (n = 50) pre-weaned grey seal pups and samples of differing natal substrates (n = 8) from an off-shore island devoid of livestock and permanent human habitation to determine if CLO DNA is present in these mammals and to identify possible sources. Results We recovered CLO DNA from 32/92 (34.7%) nasal swabs from both live (n = 17) and dead (n = 15) seal pups that clustered most closely with currently recognised species belonging to three chlamydial families: Parachlamydiaceae (n = 22), Rhabdochlamydiaceae (n = 6), and Simkaniaceae (n = 3). All DNA positive sediment samples (n = 7) clustered with the Rhabdochlamydiaceae. No difference was found in rates of recovery of CLO DNA in live versus dead pups suggesting the organisms are commensal but their potential as opportunistic secondary pathogens could not be determined. Conclusion This is the first report of CLO DNA being found in marine mammals. This identification warrants further investigation in other seal populations around the coast of the UK and in other areas of the world to determine if this finding is unique or more common than shown by this data. Further investigation would also be warranted to determine if they are present as purely commensal organisms or whether they could also be opportunistic pathogens in seals, as well as to investigate possible sources of origin, including whether they originated as a result of anthropogenic impacts, including human waste and agricultural run-off.
DOI Link: 10.1186/s12917-021-03032-3
Rights: This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
Licence URL(s): http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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