Chimpanzee outbreak investigation

As part of an investigation of an ongoing epizootic in sanctuary chimpanzees in Sierra Leone, we used 16S microbiome analysis to look for bacterial pathogens in clinical samples. Results from chimpanzee cases and controls were compared to look for statistical associations with disease status. From these results, we identified a member of the genus Sarcina as statistically-associated with disease and based on this finding, we went on to further characterize the organism and found it to be a novel species.