University of Wisconsin-Madison researchers discovered a new parasite following the death of Mahal, an orangutan at the Milwaukee County Zoo, according to a university release.
Mahal died unexpectedly in late December 2012 at five years old.
Tony Goldberg, a UW-Madison Department of Pathobiological Sciences professor and Global Health Institute research associate director, led the team that documented the cause of Mahal’s death: a new species of tapeworm.
Working from the orangutan’s clinical condition and a tissue sample, the researchers characterized all DNA in the tissue by “deep sequencing” and found the tapeworm’s DNA.
“We knew there was some type of infection in there,” Goldberg said in the release. “It could have been nearly anything. The list of potential agents was enormous.”
The unknown species is newly recognized as a threat to primates and came in a “very unusual presentation,” according to Goldberg.
“This was an unfortunate quirk with very sad consequences,” Goldberg said.
Goldberg also said zoo workers could not prevent Mahal’s death because by the time he got sick, the infection was already out of control.
