Studies on bromadiolone resistance in Rattus rattus populations from Punjab, India

There are several reports on development of resistance to bromadiolone in different species of rodents around the globe, however, there is no such report involving systematic study from India. Hence, present study was carried out to investigate current status of bromadiolone resistance in house rat (Rattus rattus; n=154) collected from different poultry farms (n=8) based on feeding test, blood clotting response (BCR) test and molecular characterization of VKORC1 gene. Based on feeding test and BCR test, 28% rats were suspected to be resistant. Molecular analysis of VKORC1 gene of four suspected to be resistant rats having Prothrombin Time (PT) <70s, International Normalized Ratio (INR) <4.0 and died between 26 and 73days after treatment revealed no single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) in nucleotide sequences. None of the sample under study showed complete nucleotide homology with previously reported nucleotide sequences of R. rattus. The sequences of VKORC1 gene under study can thus be considered as the novel sequences. Present investigation on molecular characterization of VKORC1 gene did not reveal any genetic resistance in Rattus rattus population against bromadiolone though rats could be considered resistant based on BCR and feeding tests.