Center on Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases
Monday, July 15, 2024

Brain invasion of bovine coronavirus: molecular analysis of bovine coronavirus infection in calves with severe pneumonia and neurological signs

Photo by Leah Newhouse courtesy of Pexels.com

An article co-authored by the Director of the Center of Excellence for Emerging and Zoonotic Animal Diseases (CEEZAD, www.ceezad.org) and the Center on Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (CEZID; https://www.k-state.edu/cezid/) studies the ability of the bovine coronavirus to impact the brain.

The article was co-authored by Dr. Juergen A. Richt, Regents and University Distinguished Professor at Kansas State University and director of CEEZAD and CEZID. It was published in the May 24 edition of the Journal of Veterinary Science. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37938158/

Although the role of bovine coronavirus (BCoV) in calf diarrhea and respiratory disorders is well documented, its contribution to neurological diseases is unclear.

The study involved virological investigations of calves showing diarrhea and respiratory and neurological signs.

An outbreak of diarrhea, respiratory, and neurological disorders occurred among 12 calves in July 2022 in Istanbul, Türkiye. Two of these calves exhibited neurological signs and died a few days after the appearance of symptoms. One of these calves was necropsied and analyzed using molecular and histopathological tests.

BCoV RNA was detected in the brain, lung, spleen, liver, and intestine of the calf that had neurological signs by real-time reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction. Immunostaining was also observed in the intestine and brain. A 622 bp S1 gene product was amplified from RNA derived from the brain. Phylogenetic analysis indicated that the BCoV detected in this study had a high homology to the BCoV strain GIb with 99.19% nucleotide sequence identity to the BCoV strains detected in Poland, Israel, Türkiye, and France.. In addition, the highest identity (98,72%) was obtained with the HECV 4408 and L07748 strains of human coronaviruses.

In summary, the BCoV detected in a calf brain from turkey belongs to the GIb-European lineage and shares high sequence homology with BCoV isolates detected in Europe and Israel. In addition, the similarity with human coronaviruses (4408 and L07748) raises questions about the zoonotic potential of the BCoV detected in this study.