Emerging infectious disease implications of invasive mammalian species : the greater white-toothed shrew (Crocidura russula) is associated with a novel serovar of pathogenic Leptospira in Ireland

The greater white-toothed shrew (Crocidura russula) is an invasive mammalian species that was first recorded in Ireland in 2007. It currently occupies an area of approximately 7,600 km2 on the island. C. russula is normally distributed in Northern Africa and Western Europe, and was previously absent from the British Isles. Whilst invasive species can have dramatic and rapid impacts on faunal and floral communities, they may also be carriers of pathogens facilitating disease transmission in potentially naive populations. Pathogenic leptospires are endemic in Ireland and a significant cause of human and animal disease. From 18 trapped C. russula, 3 isolates of Leptospira were cultured. However, typing of these isolates by standard serological reference methods was negative, and suggested an, as yet, unidentified serovar. Sequence analysis of 16S ribosomal RNA and secY indicated that these novel isolates belong to Leptospira alstonii, a unique pathogenic species of which only 7 isolates have been described to date. Earlier isolations were limited geographically to China, Japan and Malaysia, and this leptospiral species had not previously been cultured from mammals. Restriction enzyme analysis (REA) further confirms the novelty of these strains since no similar patterns were observed with a reference database of leptospires. As with other pathogenic Leptospira species, these isolates contain lipL32 and do not grow in the presence of 8-azagunaine; however no evidence of disease was apparent after experimental infection of hamsters. These isolates are genetically related to L. alstonii but have a novel REA pattern; they represent a new serovar which we designate as serovar Room22. This study demonstrates that invasive mammalian species act as bridge vectors of novel zoonotic pathogens such as Leptospira

The serological and genetic diversity of the Leptospira interrogans Icterohaemorrhagiae serogroup circulating in the UK

Strains of Leptospira interrogans belonging to two very closely related serovars, Icterohaemorrhagiae and Copenhageni, have been associated with disease in mammalian species and are the most frequently reported agents of human leptospirosis. They are considered the most pathogenic serovars and represent more than half of the leptospires encountered in severe human infections

Phylogeny based on <i>secY</i>.

<p>Phylogenetic reconstruction was inferred using the maximum likelihood method. The tree is drawn to scale, with branch lengths measured in the number of substitutions per site.</p

MAT results of hamsters infected with GWTS isolates.

<p>MAT results of hamsters infected with GWTS isolates.</p

Phylogeny based on 16S rDNA.

<p>Phylogenetic reconstruction based on maximum likelihood estimation. Branch lengths are proportional to the number of substitutions per site and branch values are the bootstrap values assigned to the edges (i.e. the branch support values).</p

Fluorescent antibody test of GWTS #1.

<p>GWTS isolate #1 is reactive with fluorescent conjugated antibody as routinely used to detect leptospires in infected animal tissues.</p

MAT titres of reference serogroup antigens with antisera specific for each GWTS Isolates 1, 2 & 3.

<p>MAT titres of reference serogroup antigens with antisera specific for each GWTS Isolates 1, 2 & 3.</p

Restriction Enzyme Analysis of GWTS isolates of <i>Leptospira</i>.

<p>Genomic DNA from GWTS isolates #1 (1), #2 (2) and #3 (3) were compared by REA to that of <i>L</i>. <i>alstonii</i> isolates of serovar Pingchang (4), serovar Sichuan (5), MS 267 (6), MS 311 (7) and MS 316 (8). L = DNA Marker.</p

Coming out of the Coming Out Story: Writing Queer Lives

This article examines the challenges posed to the western lesbian and gay life writing paradigm of the coming out story by postmodern and global cultures. It reads two memoirs published in the 1990s that queer the coming out plot, one of an American lesbian-turned-heterosexual, the other of a Chinese woman describing her relationships with women and men during the Cultural Revolution. Jan Clausen's Apples and Oranges: My Journey Through Sexual Identity and Anchee Min's Red Azalea each reject coming out and its essentialist model of sexual identity, showing too its Western specificity. However, they equally avoid a fully deconstructive version of queer, Clausen in elegising her past lesbian self, Min in poeticising sexuality as the wellspring of individuation and anti-totalitarian resistance. While queers unravelling of homogenous models of sexual narrative has been liberating, it cannot yet rival the power of traditional modernist sexual stories, whether in creating community in the fragmented West, or individual rights in totalitarian societies such as China of the late 1960s-early 1970s