Characterization of a Novel RNA Virus Discovered in the Autumnal Moth Epirrita autumnata in Sweden

de Miranda, Joachim R.; Hedman, Harald; Onorati, Piero; Stephan, Jörg; Karlberg, Olof; Bylund, Helena; Terenius, Olle

The starting point of the current study was the 2013 autumnal moth outbreak in northern Fennoscandia. Among the samples collected at the Abisko sampling site were a number of larvae with obvious disease symptoms (Supplementary Materials Figure S2 ). The RNA and DNA from two of the most affected larvae were submitted to Illumina sequencing. These sequences were assembled and compared to the public databases, with particular emphasis on pathogen signatures. The analyses of the DNA phase identified a novel baculovirus at low abundance (to be described in a separate publication). Analysis of the RNA phase on the other hand revealed in one of the samples an overwhelming abundance of microbial sequences, with 88% of the reads belonging to a 0.8 kb contig with 91% amino acid identity to an Acinetobacter baumannii hypothetical protein (GenBank WP_071209019.1) and 7% of the reads to a single 10 kb RNA virus. Only 4% of the reads belonged to the E. autumnata transcriptome and the remaining reads were mostly of bacterial and fungal origin. Given its abundance, this 10 kb Abisko virus merited further investigation.