Betaherpesvirus PCR, rabies virus RT-PCR and rabies virus neutralising antibody test results for Peruvian bats

This data record consists of a single dataset: BHV_VBRV_testing_all_samples.xlsx.

The dataset includes Betaherpesvirus polymerase chain reaction (PCR), Rabies virus reverse transcription (RT)-PCR and Rabies virus neutralising antibody test results for Peruvian bats (predominantly Desmodus rotundus). The PCR samples (saliva, fecal and blood samples), were collected between 2015 and 2018.

The Metadata tab provides descriptions of all the variables in the “BHV_PCR_VBRV_Set” tab.

Ethical approval: All capture and sampling of bats was approved by the Research Ethics Committee of the University of Glasgow School of Medical, Veterinary and Life Sciences (Ref081/15) and by the University of Georgia Animal Care and Use Committee (A2014 04-016-Y3-A5). Field collections were authorized by the Peruvian government (RD‐009‐2015‐SERFOR‐DGGSPFFS, RD‐264‐2015 SERFOR‐DGGSPFFS, RD‐142‐2015‐ SERFOR‐DGGSPFFS, RD‐054‐2016‐SERFOR‐DGGSPFFS).

Study aims and methodology:

Rabies is a viral zoonosis transmitted by vampire bats across Latin America. Substantial public health and agricultural burdens remain, despite decades of bats culls and livestock vaccinations. Virally vectored vaccines that spread autonomously through bat populations are a theoretically appealing solution to managing rabies in its reservoir host. In this study, the authors investigated the biological and epidemiological suitability of newly discovered betaherpesvirus (DrBHV) to act as a vaccine vector. Specifically, the three main objectives of the study were: (1) to quantify BHV prevalence across populations and demographic groups of vampire bats in Peru, in comparison to that of VBRV, (2) to use phylogenetic analyses of DrBHV and other newly described bat BHVs to investigate the host specificity of DrBHV among sympatric bat species, and (3) to use deep sequencing to evaluate the potential for DrBHV super-infections in individual bats and obtain a whole genome sequence to evaluate the structural similarity of DrBHV to already developed BHV vectors.

The following procedures are described in more detail in the published article: sample collection, nucleic acid extraction, amplification and sequencing of betaherpesviruses, molecular confirmation of bat species identities, amplification and sequencing of vampire bat rabies virus, detection of rabies virus neutralising antibodies, statistical analysis, phylogenetic inference, whole genome sequencing and bioinformatics analysis.