The Goose Guangdong virus refers to the strain A/Goose/Guangdong/1/96 (Gs/Gd)-like H5N1 HPAI viruses. It is a strain of the

Influenzavirus A '' A virus'' (''IAV'') causes influenza in birds and some mammals, and is the only species of the genus ''Alphainfluenzavirus'' of the virus family '' Orthomyxoviridae''. Strains of all subtypes of influenza A virus have been isolated from wi ...

subtype

H5N1 Influenza A virus subtype H5N1 (A/H5N1) is a subtype of the influenza A virus which can cause illness in humans and many other animal species. A bird-adapted strain of H5N1, called HPAI A(H5N1) for highly pathogenic avian influenza virus of typ ...

virus that was first detected in a

goose A goose ( : geese) is a bird of any of several waterfowl species in the family Anatidae. This group comprises the genera ''Anser'' (the grey geese and white geese) and '' Branta'' (the black geese). Some other birds, mostly related to the ...

Guangdong Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020) ...

in 1996. It is an HPAI (High Pathogenic Avian Influenza) virus, meaning that it can kill a very high percentage of chickens in a flock in mere days. It is believed to be the immediate precursor of the current dominant strain of HPAI A(H5N1) that evolved from 1999 to 2002 creating the Z genotype (also called "Asian lineage HPAI A(H5N1)") that is spreading globally and is

epizootic In epizoology, an epizootic (from Greek: ''epi-'' upon + ''zoon'' animal) is a disease event in a nonhuman animal population analogous to an epidemic in humans. An epizootic may be restricted to a specific locale (an "outbreak"), general (an "epi ...

(an epidemic in nonhumans) and panzootic (affecting animals of many species, especially over a wide area), killing tens of millions of birds and spurring the

culling In biology, culling is the process of segregating organisms from a group according to desired or undesired characteristics. In animal breeding, it is the process of removing or segregating animals from a breeding stock based on a specific tr ...

of hundreds of millions of others to stem its spread.Chapter Two : Avian Influenza by Timm C. Harder and Ortrud Werner
in ''Influenza Report 2006'' The conversion to the Z genotype probably occurred by reassortment with a

teal alt=American teal duck (male), Green-winged teal (male) Teal is a greenish-blue colour. Its name comes from that of a bird — the Eurasian teal (''Anas crecca'') — which presents a similarly coloured stripe on its head. The word is ofte ...

(duck) virus H6N1 during a mixed influenza infection: :"An H6N1 virus isolated from teal (A/teal/Hong Kong/W312/97 6N1 showed very high (>98%) nucleotide homology to the human influenza virus A/Hong Kong/156/97 (H5N1) in the six internal genes. The N1

neuraminidase Exo-α-sialidase (EC 3.2.1.18, sialidase, neuraminidase; systematic name acetylneuraminyl hydrolase) is a glycoside hydrolase that cleaves the glycosidic linkages of neuraminic acids: : Hydrolysis of α-(2→3)-, α-(2→6)-, α-(2→8)- glycos ...

sequence showed 97% nucleotide homology to that of the human

virus, and the N1 protein of both viruses had the same 19-amino-acid deletion in the stalk region. The deduced hemagglutinin amino acid sequence of the H6N1 virus was most similar to that of A/shearwater/Australia/1/72 ( H6N5). The H6N1 virus is the first known isolate with seven H5N1-like segments and may have been the donor of the neuraminidase and the internal genes of the H5N1 viruses. The high homology between the internal genes of

H9N2 Influenza A virus subtype H9N2 (A/H9N2) is a subtype of the species Influenza A virus (bird flu virus). Since 1998 a total of 86 cases of human infection with H9N2 viruses have been reported. Infection in birds H9N2 is the most common subtype o ...

, H6N1, and the

isolates indicates that these subtypes are able to exchange their internal genes and are therefore a potential source of new pathogenic influenza virus strains."Journal of Virology, July 2000, p. 6309-6315, Vol. 74, No. 14
article ''Characterization of the Influenza A Virus Gene Pool in Avian Species in Southern China: Was H6N1 a Derivative or a Precursor of H5N1?''

See also

Sources and notes

Further reading