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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Microbiol.

Sec. Infectious Agents and Disease

Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2025.1677761

This article is part of the Research TopicZoonotic Diseases: Epidemiology, Multi-omics, and Host-pathogen Interactions Vol IIView all 10 articles

Lung microbiota of raccoon dogs (Nyctereutes procyonoides) using high-throughput sequencing

Provisionally accepted
Wei  LiWei Li1,2Xin  LiXin Li2Ran  Jing ChengRan Jing Cheng2Jie  LiuJie Liu2Jun  Jin LiuJun Jin Liu2Yu  WangYu Wang2Yuan  WanzheYuan Wanzhe1*Jun  Er RenJun Er Ren2*
  • 1Hebei Agricultural University, Baoding, China
  • 2Shijiazhuang Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Sciences, Shijiazhuang, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Pneumonia frequently causes mass mortality in raccoon dogs, resulting in significant economic loss. Additionally, raccoon dogs carry various zoonotic pathogens. This study systematically assessed pulmonary pathogens in raccoon dogs and their potential public health implications utilizing 2bRAD microbiome sequencing (2bRAD-M) and viral metagenomics. We analyzed 30 lung tissue samples for microbial composition. Sequencing revealed Pseudomonadota, Ascomycota, and Actinobacteria as dominant phyla and Acinetobacter, Escherichia, and Klebsiella as predominant genera. The most abundant species were Acinetobacter baumannii, Escherichia coli, and Klebsiella pneumoniae. In total, 158 species across 84 genera were identified, including 49 potentially zoonotic species. Viral metagenomics revealed Peduoviridae, Rountreeviridae, and Parvoviridae as dominant families, with Valbvirus ValB1MD2, Andhravirus andhra, and Amdoparvovirus carnivoran3 comprising over 80% of the viral composition. These findings highlight the pathogenic complexity of raccoon dog pneumonia and its zoonotic risks, providing crucial insights for disease control and public health management.

Keywords: Raccoon dog, bacterial diversity, 2bRAD-M, viral metagenomics, pathogens

Received: 07 Aug 2025; Accepted: 06 Oct 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Li, Li, Cheng, Liu, Liu, Wang, Wanzhe and Ren. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence:
Yuan Wanzhe, yuanwanzhe@126.com
Jun Er Ren, renerjun2012@163.com

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