Meeting Abstract
Although bats appear to be reservoir hosts for many diseases including zoonoses, how they respond immunologically to these pathogens without succumbing to them is poorly understood. This can pose a challenge when attempting to predict spillover to humans, with the ultimate goal aimed at disease prevention. Comparing factors such as the environment, proximity to humans, reproductive stage, and diet, to certain gene expression profiles, especially focusing on immune genes can assist in further identification of spillover dynamics. For this pilot study, transcriptomic gene expression analysis was used with spleen tissue from eight African fruit bats (Epomophorus labiatus), comparing expression between pregnant and non-pregnant bats. RNA was isolated from samples collected in sub-Saharan Africa and next generation sequencing was performed. We then analysed differential gene expression using a de novo transcriptome assembly with DRAP, pseudo-alignment with Salmon, and differential expression analysis with DESeq2. Although pregnancy has generally been considered a period of immune compromise in mammals, preliminary results showed pregnancy was not the primary variable determining variation in gene expression in these bats. We identified 251 differentially expressed transcripts using an FDR cutoff of 0.05. Some of these genes appear to function in immune responses and may contribute to disease spread. Further investigation with larger sample sizes, compared across multiple covariates, and including samples during various seasons will enhance the knowledge of bat immune responses in regards to their ability to be reservoir hosts. This information can aid in prevention of disease, as bats and humans continuously interact.
