I just found this very interesting hypothesis put forth by Sandra Porter, a microbiologist/molecular biologist/bioinformatics scientist.
She researched the phylogenetic tree and genome sequence of different viruses and came to the conclusion that the present H1N1 virus in California
originated from a 2007 Ohio outbreak.
This afternoon, I was working on educational activities and suddenly realized that the H1N1 strain that caused the California outbreak might be
the same strain that caused an outbreak in 2007 at an Ohio country fair. Here's the data.
Once I realized that the genome sequences from the H1N1 swine flu were in the NCBI's virus genome resources database, I had to take a look.
And, like eating potato chips, making phylogenetic trees is a little bit addictive. Or maybe it was just the adrenaline rush that hit when I realized
that every tree was telling me the same thing.
What did those trees say?
They all said the California swine virus is most closely related to a swine flu virus from Ohio and very different from other H1N1 viruses that have
infected humans. In fact, in some cases, it seems like the H1N1 virus is very similar to a virus that caused an outbreak in 2007 at an Ohio country
fair (1).
Okay, let's look at the data. I used H1N1 (and a couple of H1N2) protein sequences from Swine and Humans between Jan 1 2006 and today. This gave
between 324 and 600 sequences for each tree and every case, the California sequences clustered with those from the Ohio pigs.
For every single protein sequence tested, the 4 California isolates clustered with the sequence from the country fair pig from Ohio.
In a few cases, one other Ohio pig isolate (2) was part of the cluster. The sum of the phylogenetic analyses are compelling and support the hypothesis
that the California H1N1 swine flu virus may have come from Ohio.
scienceblogsPlease visit the link provided for the complete story.
Interesting stuff, especially since as I understand it, they have found no sick pigs in Mexico. (this is my understanding not a fact).
Wouldn't it be something if this strain actually originated in the US.
