Poster Presentation Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution Conference 2016

Global phylogeography of Coccidioides spp.; the etiologic agent of Valley Fever (#709)

David M Engelthaler 1 , Chandler C. Roe 1 , Crystal Hepp 2 , Marcus Teixeira 1 , Elizabeth M. Driebe 1 , James M. Schupp 1 , Lalitha Gade 3 , Victor Waddell 4 , Kenneth Komatsu 4 , Eduardo Arathoon 5 , Heidi Logemann 6 , George R Thompson, III 7 , Tom Chiller 3 , Bridget Barker 1 , Paul Keim 1 8 , Anastasia P. Litvintseva 3
  1. TGen North, Translational Genomics Research Institute, Flagstaff, AZ, USA
  2. Informatics and Computing Program, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ, United States
  3. Mycotic Diseases Branch, National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, GA, USA
  4. Division of Public Health Services, Arizona Department of Health Services, Phoenix, AZ, USA
  5. Asociación de Salud Integral, Guatemala City, Guatemala
  6. Universidad de San Carlos, Guatemala City, Guatemala
  7. Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Medicine, University of California Davis, Davis, CA, USA
  8. Center for Microbial Genetics and Genomics, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ, USA

Each year, the etiologic agents, Coccidioides immitis and C. posadasii, cause Valley Fever in tens of thousands of individuals. While it widely accepted that this fungal disease is endemic to arid locations, such as the southwestern United States, the recent discovery of endemic clusters in Washington state suggests an expansion of the geographic range. Here, we present a whole genome analysis of 86 genomes, where 68 are unique to this study. The incorporation of Bayesian phylogenetics resulted in the identification of phylogeographic structure of both species, and calibrations on the root node reveal that C. posadasii is the more ancient of the two species. Taken together, we propose that C. posadasii originated near the Arizona-Mexico border, and we suggest a subsequent dispersal mechanism and route of spread.