Potential Bat-like Rotavirus in Hospitalized Children with Diarrhea from the Dominican Republic

Interspecies transmission is an important aspect of rotavirus evolution and is enhanced by the close contact between humans and animals. The role of bats as a reservoir or intermediary host for viruses associated with human gastroenteritis is poorly understood, but there are reports of rotaviruses detected in humans that contain genes from bat rotavirus. In this study, a total of 15 rotavirus positive samples from children hospitalized for gastroenteritis in 2007 in the Dominican Republic were investigated by sequencing of the capsid VP4, VP7 and VP6 genes to identify genetic variants. The most common genotypes were G1-P[8]-I1, G3-P[6]-I2 and G12-P[8]-I1. Interestingly, 3 of the 15 sequenced strains had VP7 encoding genes highly similar (≥97%) to those of bat rotaviruses of the G3 genotype detected in Bulgaria in 2008. These VP7 sequences were more distantly related (≤92%) to other G3 rotavirus found in bat, human, rabbit, pigs, rat and monkeys. Only 1 VP4 sequence was available from the bat-like rotavirus yielding genotype P[6]. This and other identified P [6] sequences were more related to human than to porcine derived P[6] sequences. Furthermore, 4 of 10 available VP6 sequences, including the 3 from the G3 bat-like strains, showed high nucleotide identity (>97%) with VP6 of I2 genotype from bat rotavirus detected in Kenya in 2015. A novel observation was the finding of 4 children of ≥1 year of age hospitalized with gastroenteritis and infected with bat-like rotavirus. This study extends previous knowledge on rotavirus interspecies transmission and warrants future rotavirus studies on bats and children from Dominican.