The Federal State Budgetary Institution "VNIIZG", with the support of a grant from the Ministry of Education and Science, conducted a series of studies to study the causative agent of contagious lumpy skin disease in cattle

Some of the achievements of this grant-funded work include:
- Isolation and characterization of epizootic viruses, as well as expansion of the Strain Collection. For the first time in the world, facts of homologous recombination between vaccine strains of the LSD virus have been established and described . These data indicate the imported nature of all outbreaks in RUSSIA since 2017, as well as the correctness of the choice of the strategy for using a heterologous vaccine based on the sheeppox virus.
- For the first time in the world, the fact of contact transmission characteristic only of vaccine-like recombinant isolates of the LSD virus has been established, complementing modern understanding of virus transmission in cold climates without the participation of arthropods;
- For the first time, the widespread distribution of unique vaccine-like recombinant isolates across Russia from 2017 to 2022 and in Southeast Asia has been shown, and the epizootology of LSD in the northern latitudes of the Russian Federation has been studied in detail, including virus overwintering at subzero temperatures.

The generalization of fundamental works in this area within the framework of the grant is the work of scientists from the Federal State Budgetary Institution All-Russian Research Institute of Animal HEALTH and international expert authors on the analysis of the features of molecular evolution and recombination in poxviruses in general.

This paper is an English-language guide to the literature reporting genomic changes in poxviruses (Sprygin, A., Mazloum, A., van Schalkwyk, A., & Babiuk, S. (2022). Capripoxviruses, leporipoxviruses, and orthopoxviruses: Occurrences of recombination. Frontiers in microbiology, 13, 978829.).

The results of the grant work were published in reputable international high-ranking journals (we present some of the works, Quartile 1 (Q1)):

Byadovskaya, O., Prutnikov, P., Shalina, K., Babiuk, S., Perevozchikova, N., Korennoy, F.,
Chvala, I., Kononov, A., & Sprygin, A. (2022). The changing epidemiology of lumpy skin
disease in Russia since the first introduction from 2015 to 2020. Transboundary and emerging
diseases, 69(5), e2551–e2562. 

Krotova, A., Byadovskaya, O., Shumilova, I., van Schalkwyk, A., & Sprygin, A. (2022). An in-
depth bioinformatic analysis of the novel recombinant lumpy skin disease virus strains: from
unique patterns to established lineage. BMC genomics, 23(1), 396.

Krotova, A., Mazloum, A., Byadovskaya, O., & Sprygin, A. (2022). Phylogenetic analysis of
lumpy skin disease virus isolates in Russia in 2019-2021. Archives of virology, 167(8),
1693–1699. 

Nesterov, A., Mazloum, A., Byadovskaya, O., Shumilova, I., Van Schalkwyk, A., Krotova, A.,
Kirpichenko, V., Donnik, I., Chvala, I., & Sprygin, A. (2022). Experimentally controlled study
indicates that the naturally occurring recombinant vaccine-like lumpy skin disease strain
Udmurtiya/2019, detected during freezing winter in northern latitudes, is transmitted via indirect
contact. Frontiers in veterinary science, 9, 1001426.)

Shumilova, I., Krotova, A., Nesterov, A., Byadovskaya, O., van Schalkwyk, A., & Sprygin, A.
(2022). Overwintering of recombinant lumpy skin disease virus in northern latitudes, Russia.
Transboundary and emerging diseases, 69(5), e3239–e3243. 

Shumilova, I., Nesterov, A., Byadovskaya, O., Prutnikov, P., Wallace, D.B., Mokeeva, M.,
Pronin, V., Kononov, A., Chvala, I., & Sprygin, A. ( 2022). A Recombinant Vaccine-like Strain
of Lumpy Skin Disease Virus Causes Low-Level Infection of Cattle through Virus-Inoculated
Feed. Pathogens (Basel, Switzerland), 11(8), 920. 

Sprygin, A., Sainnokhoi, T., Gombo-Ochir, D., Tserenchimed, T., Tsolmon, A., Byadovskaya,
O., Ankhanbaatar, U., Mazloum, A., Korennoy, F., & Chvala, I. (2022). Genetic characterization
and epidemiological analysis of the first lumpy skin disease virus outbreak in Mongolia, 2021.
Transboundary and emerging diseases, 69(6), 3664–3672.)

it should also be noted that the current world-class results under the grant of the Ministry of Education and Science No. 075-15-2021-1054 have laid a reliable fundamental basis for a comprehensive study of capripoxviruses at the All-Russian Research Institute of Animal Health, and the specialized staff of the center have acquired valuable experience in the implementation and development of genetic technologies in laboratory practice.

Lumpy skin disease (LSD) is a transboundary, especially dangerous viral disease of cattle that causes significant economic damage. Previously limited to the African continent and a number of neighboring countries with a hot climate, LSD was first introduced to Russia in 2015 in the Republic of Dagestan, and between 2015 and 2019, the LSD virus has unprecedentedly spread to the regions of Siberia and the Far East of the Russian Federation, covering more than 9,000 km and a number of climatic zones.

This case of the introduction and rapid mass spread of the disease once again demonstrates the need for increased readiness of veterinary services and research institutes to take rapid response measures in relation to transboundary, and especially exotic, diseases.

Since the appearance of the first outbreaks of ZUD, specialists from the Federal State Budgetary Institution “All-Russian Research Institute of Animal Health” have begun research work on a disease that is new to our country.

Molecular genetic analysis showed that in 2015-2016 the circulating virus was genetically identical and related to the virus circulating in the affected regions of the Middle East, the Balkans and Europe.

However, from 2017 to 2020, outbreaks in Russia were caused by previously unrecorded recombinant vaccine-like isolates with high virulence, formed by the Neethling vaccine strain and the Kenyan vaccine strain KSGP. Moreover, each new outbreak was caused by a unique variant of the virus, which had never been observed before for viruses of the Poxviridae family.

The study of the causes of the sharp genotypic diversity and wide distribution of LSD in cattle in conditions of moderate and cold climates was carried out by the staff of the reference laboratory of cattle diseases of the Federal State Budgetary Institution "VNIIZG".