One of them is the class of viruses associated with the deadly disease of densovirus, shrimp, cockroach, cricket, moth, crayfish and silkworm. It was more likely to be present in sick muscles and in denser densities compared to healthy control subjects.
“Before this, we were throwing up our hands,” said Tony Goldberg, a veterinary pathologist and co-author at the University of Wisconsin. “Now we have a clear hypothesis.”
The findings do not conclusively show that the virus dies. Other factors – bacteria, invasive bile, warming water – can interact with the novel virus to weaken or kill freshwater oysters.
Tracy Dubois, an ecologist from Virginia Tech who is not included in the paper, has studied the role of drought in muscle die-in. “I think it’s very complementary,” he said of the new findings. Seeing how little we know about cold biology and mortality, Du DuBoss said, “It all goes together.”
Next, Wisconsin researchers will isolate and study the novel virus in a lab setting and, ultimately, use it to experiment on thousands of small live, hatchery-grown oysters. Below the line, they will be able to develop a rapid test to detect the virus in cultured or wild oyster populations. But there are big obstacles in studying Shindi.
Unlike humans, chimpanzees or even oysters (where there is no economic or humanitarian drive for this type of virus), researchers do not have an established model for working with freshwater oyster cells. That means they don’t have a clear picture of how to grow muscle cells or viruses in the lab.
