Mycobacterium leprae diversity and population dynamics in medieval Europe from novel ancient genomes
Pfrengle, Saskia (University of Tübingen. Institute of Evolutionary Medicine)
Neukamm, Judith (University of Tübingen. Institute for Archaeological Sciences)
Guellil, Meriam (University of Tartu. Estonian Biocentre, Institute of Genomics)
Keller, Marcel (University of Tartu. Institute of Genomics)
Molak, Martyna (University of Warsaw. Centre of New Technologies)
Avanzi, Charlotte (Colorado State University. Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology)
Kushniarevich, Alena (University of Tartu. Institute of Genomics)
Montes, Núria (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. Departament de Biologia Animal, de Biologia Vegetal i d'Ecologia)
Neumann, Gunnar U. (Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History)
Reiter, Ella (University of Tübingen. Institute for Archaeological Sciences)
Tukhbatova, Rezeda I. (Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History)
Berezina, Nataliya Y. (Moscow State University. Research Institute and Museum of Anthropology)
Buzhilova, Alexandra P. (Moscow State University. Research Institute and Museum of Anthropology)
Korobov, Dmitry S. (Russian Academy of Sciences. Institute of Archaeology)
Suppersberger Hamre, Stian (University of Bergen. Department of Archaeology, History, Cultural studies and religion)
Matos, Vitor M. J. (University of Coimbra. Department of Life Sciences)
Ferreira, Maria T. (Universidad de León. Departamento de Biodiversidad y Gestión Ambiental)
González-Garrido, Laura (Universidad de León. Departamento de Biodiversidad y Gestión Ambiental)
Wasterlain, Sofia N. (University of Coimbra. Department of Life Sciences)
Lopes, Célia (University of Coimbra. Department of Life Sciences)
Santos, Ana Luisa (University of Coimbra. Department of Life Sciences)
Antunes-Ferreira, Nathalie (Instituto Universitário Egas Moniz)
Duarte, Vitória (University of Coimbra. Department of Life Sciences)
Silva, Ana Maria (University of Coimbra. Department of Life Sciences)
Melo, Linda (University of Coimbra. Department of Life Sciences)
Sarkic, Natasa (OSTEO Research)
Saag, Lehti (University of Tartu. Institute of Genomics)
Tambets, Kristiina (University of Tartu. Institute of Genomics)
Busso, Philippe (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne. Global Health Institute)
Cole, Stewart T. (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne. Global Health Institute)
Avlasovich, Alexei (Mogilev State A. Kuleshov University. Department of Archeology, History of Belarus and Special Historical Disciplines)
Roberts, Charlotte A. (Durham University. Department of Archaeology)
Sheridan, Alison (National Museums Scotland. Department of Scottish History and Archaeology)
Cessford, Craig (University of Cambridge. Department of Archaeology)
Robb, John (University of Cambridge. Department of Archaeology)
Krause, Johannes (University of Tübingen. Institute for Archaeological Sciences)
Scheib, Christiana L. (University of Cambridge. St John's College)
Inskip, Sarah A. (University of Leicester. School of Archaeology and Ancient History)
Schuenemann, Verena J. (University of Tübingen. Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Paleoenvironments)

Data:	2021
Resum:	Hansen's disease (leprosy), widespread in medieval Europe, is today mainly prevalent in tropical and subtropical regions with around 200,000 new cases reported annually. Despite its long history and appearance in historical records, its origins and past dissemination patterns are still widely unknown. Applying ancient DNA approaches to its major causative agent, Mycobacterium leprae, can significantly improve our understanding of the disease's complex history. Previous studies have identified a high genetic continuity of the pathogen over the last 1500 years and the existence of at least four M. leprae lineages in some parts of Europe since the Early Medieval period. Here, we reconstructed 19 ancient M. leprae genomes to further investigate M. leprae's genetic variation in Europe, with a dedicated focus on bacterial genomes from previously unstudied regions (Belarus, Iberia, Russia, Scotland), from multiple sites in a single region (Cambridgeshire, England), and from two Iberian leprosaria. Overall, our data confirm the existence of similar phylogeographic patterns across Europe, including high diversity in leprosaria. Further, we identified a new genotype in Belarus. By doubling the number of complete ancient M. leprae genomes, our results improve our knowledge of the past phylogeography of M. leprae and reveal a particularly high M. leprae diversity in European medieval leprosaria. Our findings allow us to detect similar patterns of strain diversity across Europe with branch 3 as the most common branch and the leprosaria as centers for high diversity. The higher resolution of our phylogeny tree also refined our understanding of the interspecies transfer between red squirrels and humans pointing to a late antique/early medieval transmission. Furthermore, with our new estimates on the past population diversity of M. leprae, we gained first insights into the disease's global history in relation to major historic events such as the Roman expansion or the beginning of the regular transatlantic long distance trade. In summary, our findings highlight how studying ancient M. leprae genomes worldwide improves our understanding of leprosy's global history and can contribute to current models of M. leprae 's worldwide dissemination, including interspecies transmissions. The online version contains supplementary material available at 10. 1186/s12915-021-01120-2.
Ajuts:	European Commission 845479
Drets:	Aquest document està subjecte a una llicència d'ús Creative Commons. Es permet la reproducció total o parcial, la distribució, la comunicació pública de l'obra i la creació d'obres derivades, fins i tot amb finalitats comercials, sempre i quan es reconegui l'autoria de l'obra original.
Llengua:	Anglès
Document:	Article ; recerca ; Versió publicada
Matèria:	Ancient DNA ; Ancient pathogen genomics ; Mycobacterium leprae ; Pathogen diversity ; Leprosaria ; Pathogen population dynamics ; Paleomicrobiology ; Paleopathology
Publicat a:	BMC biology, Vol. 19 (2021) , art. 220, ISSN 1741-7007

DOI: 10.1186/s12915-021-01120-2
PMID: 34610848

18 p, 2.3 MB

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