| Jayme and colleagues find some “smoking bats”-possible bat reservoir species for Reston ebolavirus in the Philippines. |
@MackayIM all bats we sampled appeared clinically healthy.— Jonathan Epstein (@EpsteinJon) July 17, 2015
| Locating the Philippine RESTV sequences on the ebolavirus phylogenetic tree. Jayme et al. Virology J. (2105) 12:107.[1] |
- Cynopterus brachyotis (Lesser dog-faced fruit bat; range; fruit bat)
- Miniopterus australis (Little long-fingered or little bent-wing bat; range; insectivorous bat)
- Miniopterus schreibersii (Schreiber’s Bent-winged Bat; range; insectivorous bat)
- Chaerephon plicata (insectivorous bats)
What’s particularly interesting to me is that some of these bat species are found in Australia. However, keep in mind that the range of some (?many) bats may be underestimated. The example here is using the IUCN Red List’s described range for M. schreibersii-apparently it’s a bat that inhabits an area around the Mediterranean.[4] Last I looked, the Philippines is a bit south of there. In the past, as Wikipedia lists, a much bigger range was ascribed to this bat, also including Australia,[5] Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone – among many others. Looks like there may be lots of work to do in the area of bat census.
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Molecular evidence of Ebola Reston virus infection in Philippine bats
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Fruit bats as reservoirs of Ebola virus
- Many details about bats to be found at the excellent IUCN Red List
http://bitly.com/1Joahtv - Population Structure of a Cave-Dwelling Bat, Miniopterus schreibersii: Does It Reflect History and Social Organization?
http://bitly.com/1fSnrrx - Seasonal movements of the Schreibers’ bat, Miniopterus schreibersii, in the northern Iberian Peninsulahttp://bitly.com/1JoafBT
Updates…
- Added bat specie range data (and discussion) from IUCN Red List and Wikipedia.

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