VETERINARSKI ARHIV, cilt.88, sa.4, ss.467-479, 2018 (SCI-Expanded)
Canine adenoviruses are agents responsible for two different infections in Canidae. While canine adenovirus type 1 (CAV-1) causes contagious hepatitis (HCC) in dogs, canine adenovirus type 2 (CAV-2) is responsible for infectious laryngotracheitis (ILT). CAV-2, especially in the respiratory tract, leads to an infection that can result in death in young and cohabitant animals. In public housing such as shelters, in addition to opportunistic infections, a disorder defined as canine infectious respiratory disease (CIRD) may also occur frequently. In this study, 155 nasal swabs were collected from dogs in two shelters where cases of respiratory system infections were closely monitored. These samples were tested for CAV-2 using polymerise chain reaction (PCR) with primers designed for the CAV E3 (Early) gene. Positive amplicons were subjected to DNA sequencing. CAV-2 nucleic acids were present in 2.5% (4/155) of the test samples. The phylogenetic assessment of the amplicon sequences revealed a 97.7%-98.9% similarity in the local viruses. The partial sequence analyses of the E3 gene of CAV-2 showed that Turkish and Chinese strains have differences in 9 amino acids. These differences redounded on phylogenetic analyses, and the virus which was considered as a single group, is now subdivided into two subgroups. One subgroup comprises American-European isolates and the other one consists of Turkish and Chinese isolates, so this subdivision can be classified into at least two subgroups, designated China-Turkey and America-Europe. To our knowledge, this is the first study that has examined the possible role of CAV-2 in respiratory system infections in dogs in Turkey, to provide novel and updated information regarding CAV-2.