title: Ecological Opportunity, Evolution, and the Emergence of Flea-Borne Plague.
abstract: The plague bacillus Yersinia pestis is unique among the pathogenic Enterobacteriaceae in utilizing an arthropod-borne transmission route. Transmission by fleabite is a recent evolutionary adaptation that followed the divergence of Y. pestis from the closely related food- and waterborne enteric pathogen Yersinia pseudotuberculosis A combination of population genetics, comparative genomics, and investigations of Yersinia-flea interactions have disclosed the important steps in the evolution and emergence of Y. pestis as a flea-borne pathogen. Only a few genetic changes, representing both gene gain by lateral transfer and gene loss by loss-of-function mutation (pseudogenization), were fundamental to this process. The emergence of Y. pestis fits evolutionary theories that emphasize ecological opportunity in adaptive diversification and rapid emergence of new species.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Zoonotic Pathogens, Rocky Mountain Laboratories, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, Hamilton, Montana, USA jhinnebusch@niaid.nih.gov.
authors.forename: B Joseph
authors.initials: BJ
authors.lastname: Hinnebusch
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Zoonotic Pathogens, Rocky Mountain Laboratories, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, Hamilton, Montana, USA.
authors.forename: Iman
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Chouikha
authors.affiliation: MOH Key Laboratory of Systems Biology of Pathogens, Institute of Pathogen Biology, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College, Beijing, China.
authors.forename: Yi-Cheng
authors.initials: YC
authors.lastname: Sun
mesh_terms: D000220:Adaptation, Biological; D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D021821:Communicable Diseases, Emerging; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D014644:Genetic Variation; D006801:Humans; D007303:Insect Vectors / Q000382:microbiology; D010930:Plague / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000382:microbiology* / Q000635:transmission*; D005423:Siphonaptera / Q000382:microbiology*; D015010:Yersinia pestis / Q000502:physiology*