Acta Veterinaria et Zootechnica Sinica ›› 2025, Vol. 56 ›› Issue (8): 3967-3975.doi: 10.11843/j.issn.0366-6964.2025.08.034

• Preventive Veterinary Medicine • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Genome Sequencing and Pathogenicity Analysis of Infectious Bronchitis Virus M41 Strain

ZHAO Jingyu1,2(), LI Dan1, ZHANG Bing1, ZHANG Qianyi1, ZHANG Jinhua2,*(), SONG Yafen1,*(), YANG Chenghuai1,*()   

  1. 1. China Institute of Veterinary Drug Control, Beijing 100081, China
    2. Jiangxi Agricultural University, Nanchang 340045, China
  • Received:2024-10-14 Online:2025-08-23 Published:2025-08-28
  • Contact: ZHANG Jinhua, SONG Yafen, YANG Chenghuai E-mail:zjy1969133764@163.com;zhangjh1122@jxau.edu.cn;songyafen1@126.com;ychenghuai@163.com

Abstract:

In order to systematically evaluate whether the biological characteristics of infectious bronchitis virus (IBV) M41 strain will change after serial passages, we continuously passaged the IBV M41 strain (CVCC AV1511, abbreviated as AV1511-1979) introduced from France by the National Center for Veterinary Culture Collection in 1979 on SPF chickens for five times to evaluate its differences in genome variation, virus shedding, and tissue tropism. Illumina high-throughput sequencing method was used to sequence the genome sequences before and after passage, and an IBV challenge model was established. RT-PCR, RT-qPCR and tracheal ring cilia swing test were used to evaluate the differences before and after passage in tems of virus content, clinical symptom observation and tissue tropism. The results showed that the whole genome of the AV1511-1979 strain did not mutate after 5 generations of continuous passage on SPF chickens, but it was quite different from Mass strains from other sources in 1ab, 5a, 4b and N protein regions. In the virus challenge model, the inoculated chickens showed obvious clinical symptoms such as depression, mouth breathing and respiratory rales. The ciliary activity of the tracheal ring was examined by autopsy, and it was found that the ciliary activity was poor or stopped. The results of RT-qPCR showed that the virus could be replicated in the trachea, lung, kidney, glandular stomach, duodenum and cecal tonsil of infected chickens, especially in the trachea, kidney and glandular stomach. There was no significant difference in viral load before and after passage. The results showed that the biological characteristics of the IBV M41 strain, AV1511-1979, were stable and did not change within 5 generations on SPF chickens. As a standard virulent strain for the production of IBV inactivated vaccine and IBV vaccine testing, our work provides a reference for the generation control of production viruses and vaccine evaluation.

Key words: avian infectious bronchitis virus, M41 strain, SPF chickens, passage, biological characteristics

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