PLOS Science Wednesday: Hi Reddit, we are Lisa Jones-Engel, Stacey
Schultz-Cherry, and Christopher Small. We published a study in PLOS
Pathogens demonstrating new evidence of the role of primates in th
Abstract
Hi Reddit, My name is Lisa Jones-Engel and I am a Senior Research
Scientist at the University of Washington. For nearly two decades my
research team has focused on the infectious agents that are transmitted
at the increasingly porous human-primate interface in Asia. And my name
is Stacey Schultz-Cherry and I am a Full Member (Professor) at St Jude
Children’s Research Hospital where my research focuses on the
pathogenesis of influenza virus and enteric viruses, like Astroviruses,
especially in high-risk populations. My name is Erik Karlsson and I am a
Postdoctoral Research Associate at St Jude Children’s Research Hospital
where my research focuses on host factors, especially nutrition, that
affect the pathogenesis and evolution of influenza virus and enteric
viruses. My name is Christopher Small and I am the Head Data Scientist
at pol.is a startup applying data visualization and machine learning to
making sense of large scale conversations. I also do distributed systems
and web app development consulting as ThoughtNode Software. Before all
that, I worked with Erick Matsen at Fred Hutch Cancer Research Center,
studying metagenomics and molecular viral epidemiology. Astroviruses are
leading causes of diarrhea in children under the age of 2,
immune-compromised populations and the elderly. You can get them from
infected people but also through contaminated food and water. They also
appear to be causing encephalitis in high-risk populations. Although we
knew that Astroviruses were found in lots of different birds and
animals, we never thought human viruses could infect animals or vice
versa. We thought infections were species-specific (i.e. only human
viruses could infect humans). That changed in 2009 when we began finding
viruses in humans that were genetically more similar to animal viruses.
That’s where our recent publication titled “Non-Human Primates Harbor
Diverse Mammalian and Avian Astroviruses Including Those Associated with
Human Infections” in PLOS Pathogens provided important new data. For
the study, we sampled 879 urban, temple, captive and wild primates in
Bangladesh and Cambodia. We found that 8% of primates were infected
with diverse mammalian and avian Astroviruses, including those
previously only known to infect humans. Clearly this exemplifies One
Health and how infectious diseases of humans can impact animals we
contact and potentially vice versa. We will be answering your questions
about primates and Astroviruses at 1pm ET – Ask Us Anything!