Virome analysis of Rodents and other small animals from China provinces

Rodents, the largest group of mammalian species widely distributed through the world, are considered natural reservoirs of a large variety of viruses including many important zoonotic viruses such as hantaviruses, Lassa viruses, and tick-borne encephalitis viruses. The understanding of the meaningful viral population and the ecological diversity residing in diverse rodent species is essential for the prediction, prevention, and control of rodent-born emerging infectious diseases. Based on next-generation sequencing related metagenomic analysis, this study aimed to survey the range of mammalian viromes residing in represent small animals of the order Rodentina, Lagomorpha, and Soricomorpha in twenty provinces in China. In addition to the diet and living habits related non-mammalian viruses such as insect viruses, fungal viruses, plant viruses, and phages, we outline the spectrums of mammalian viruses (including Viruses under the families Herpesviridae, Picobirnaviridae, Anelloviridae, Circoviridae, Retroviridae, Astroviridae, Coronaviridae, Adenoviridae, Poxviridae, Papillomaviridae, Reoviridae, Arenaviridae, Arteriviridae, Bunyaviridae, Caliciviridae, Flaviviridae, Hepeviridae, Caliciviridae, Rhabdoviridae, Paramyxoviridae and Picornaviridae and the subfamily Parvovirinae) within these 3,005 small animal individuals and the basic ecological and genetic characteristics of many novel viruses out of the viral spectrums. Genetic evidences obtained in this study provides new clues in the search for the origin or evolution pattern of certain viruses, such as hantavirus, arterivirus, and coronavirus.