Isolation and Identification of Duck Plague Virus and Sequence Analysis on Its UL2 and TK Genes

In March 2015, massive deaths happened to the M18 Duck Farm and an egg-laying duck farm in Fuzhou. It was suspected of an outbreak of duck plaque. Samples of liver and esophagus from the dead birds were collected for pathogenic identification using PCR and virus isolation. Two strains with virulent characteristics were thus identified. Subsequently, a sequence analysis on their UL2 genes further confirmed the classification. In addition, the TK gene sequences of the two isolated virus strains showed a nucleotide homology of 98.7% with those of the common virulent strain as well as the vaccine strain.