Bats host major mammalian paramyxoviruses

Drexler, Jan Felix; Corman, Victor Max; Müller, Marcel Alexander; Maganga, Gael Darren; Vallo, Peter; Binger, Tabea; Gloza-Rausch, Florian; Rasche, Andrea; Yordanov, Stoian; Seebens, Antje; Oppong, Samuel; Sarkodie, Yaw Adu; Pongombo, Célestin; Lukashev, Alexander N.; Schmidt-Chanasit, Jonas; Stöcker, Andreas; Carneiro, Aroldo José Borges; Erbar, Stephanie; Maisner, Andrea; Fronhoffs, Florian; Buettner, Reinhard; Kalko, Elisabeth K.V.; Kruppa, Thomas; Franke, Carlos Roberto; Kallies, René; Yandoko, Emmanuel R.N.; Herrler, Georg; Reusken, Chantal; Hassanin, Alexandre; Krüger, Detlev H.; Matthee, Sonja; Ulrich, Rainer G.; Leroy, Eric M.; Drosten, Christian

Measles is one of the most important childhood diseases. Measles virus defines the genus Morbillivirus that also contains the canine and phocine distemper virus, a dolphin morbillivirus, as well as Rinderpest and Peste Des Petits Ruminants viruses. Novel members of the genus Morbillivirus as currently defined by the ICTV were detected for the first time in bats (neotropical vampire bats) but not in rodents (Fig. 2b) . A clade of morbillivirus-related rodentand tupaia viruses, forming an unclassified sister clade to the genus Morbillivirus, was extended by an estimated 25 novel bat and rodent viruses, confirming the unclassified genus and the Morbillivirus genus to form a major stem lineage of PV.