ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Vet. Sci.
Sec. Veterinary Infectious Diseases
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fvets.2025.1654388
Emergence of two novel viruses in Tibetan pigs with porcine diarrheal disease on the Tibetan plateau of southwest China
Provisionally accepted
- 1Southwest Minzu University, Chengdu, China
- 2Institute of Animal Science of Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Sichuan Province, Kangding, China
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Porcine diarrheal disease is a major cause of morbidity in Tibetan piglets, however, the causative agents of this disease are rarely reported. Here, the viral diversity associated with porcine diarrheal disease was investigated by analyzing the viral communities from Tibetan pigs on the Tibetan plateau of southwest China. The results revealed that 13 mammalian viruses were identified in a pooled sample. Interestingly, it is the first time that dicistrovirus (DCV) was discovered in pigs and St-Valerien-like virus (StVV) was identified in China. Furthermore, the complete genome sequence of the two strains (DCV/porcine/CHN/SCdc-2024 and StVV/porcine/CHN/SCdc-202402) were obtained. Sequence comparisons and phylogenetic analysis showed that the swine-origin DCV/porcine/CHN/SCdc-2024 strain was classified into the family Dicistroviridae with an unassigned genus, and showed distant relationship with other dicistrovirus strains in established genera, may represent members of a potential new genera within the Dicistroviridae family. Additionally, the novel StVV strain StVV/porcine/CHN/SCdc-202402 was classified into the Valovirus, whereas showed a unique phylogenetic branch compared with other swine-origin StVV strains. Notably, further case-control investigation in the 87 fecal samples using specific RT-PCR found a high DCV-positive detection rate (77.8%) in diarrheic samples with a significant P value (< 0.0001)21 DCV-positive and 2 StVV-positive strains in 27 diarrheic samples and none in 60 healthy samples, suggesting the two novel virusesDCV might associated with diarrhea in pigs. Our study reports for the first time the emergence of DCV in pigs and StVV in China, highlighting the need for further research on pathogenicity and transmission in swine hosts.
Keywords: dicistrovirus, St-Valerien-like virus, Tibetan pig, porcine diarrheal disease, phylogenetic analysis
Received: 26 Jun 2025; Accepted: 20 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Lu, Zhang, Yang, Gao, Feng, Pei, Zhang and Zhou. 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: Long Zhou, Southwest Minzu University, Chengdu, China
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