Czech White-Nose Syndrome Team together with international collaborators discovered mechanisms of tolerance that protect Palearctic bats from white-nose syndrome (WNS), the disease that caused mass die-off in North America. The discovery raises hope for a better future of bats in North American ecosystems. White-nose syndrome (WNS) is caused by a generalist pathogen Pseudogymnoascus destructans with the worst possible characteristics of an infectious fungal agent. The generalist nature of the WNS fungus means that it can infect any bat hibernating in a contaminated cave or mine and, moreover, it may remain viable and virulent, waiting for its hosts until the next hibernation period. Harmless to humans, the WNS fungus kills hibernating North American bats in winter. However, loss of voracious insectivorous bats from agricultural ecosystems may result in economic costs required for increased pest control. Without mass die-offs of bats harbouring the WNS agent in Europe, the response to disease is an enigma. To study the survival crossroads, the Czech WNS Team focused on the relationship between pathogen quantity and disease under natural conditions. High disease prevalence together with high fungal loads in absence of bat population declines in Eurasia indicates disease tolerance mechanisms, where hosts limit harm inflicted by the pathogen but do not hinder its growth. The tolerance mechanisms revealed by the Czech WNS Team is a function of bat adaptation to the presence of the pathogen. and Natália Martínková.
Scientists from the Institute of Vertebrate Biology of the ASCR have proved that bats here suffer from the white-nose syndrome, a fungal disease that is threatening the ecosystem in North America. In the Czech Republic as well as in other parts of Europe, bats with this syndrome die only very rarely and the disease has not yet caused a decline in the bat population. Uncovering the cause of “European immunity” could save North American bats and avert also the disruption of the biological balance in that part of the world. New knowledge of the pathology of bats infected with the white-nose syndrome fungus in Europe was published by an international team of researchers in the Journal of Wildlife Diseases. and Natália Martínková.