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- Title
Bayesian Inference of the Evolution of HBV/E.
- Authors
Andernach, Iris E.; Hunewald, Oliver E.; Muller, Claude P.
- Abstract
Despite its wide spread and high prevalence in sub-Saharan Africa, hepatitis B virus genotype E (HBV/E) has a surprisingly low genetic diversity, indicating an only recent emergence of this genotype in the general African population. Here, we performed extensive phylogeographic analyses, including Bayesian MCMC modeling. Our results indicate a mutation rate of 1.9×10−4 substitutions per site and year (s/s/y) and confirm a recent emergence of HBV/E, most likely within the last 130 years, and only after the transatlantic slave-trade had come to an end. Our analyses suggest that HBV/E originated from the area of Nigeria, before rapidly spreading throughout sub-Saharan Africa. Interestingly, viral strains found in Haiti seem to be the result of multiple introductions only in the second half of the 20th century, corroborating an absence of a significant number of HBV/E strains in West Africa several centuries ago. Our results confirm that the hyperendemicity of HBV(E) in today's Africa is a recent phenomenon and likely the result of dramatic changes in the routes of viral transmission in a relatively recent past.
- Subjects
SUB-Saharan Africa; HEPATITIS B virus; HUMAN genetic variation; PHYLOGEOGRAPHY; BAYESIAN analysis; INFECTIOUS disease transmission
- Publication
PLoS ONE, 2013, Vol 8, Issue 11, p1
- ISSN
1932-6203
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1371/journal.pone.0081690