About the Authors

Wentong Cai

Affiliation Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America

Yvonne Wannemuehler

Affiliation Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America

Giuseppe Dell'Anna

Affiliation Laboratory Animal Resources, College of Veterinary Medicine, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America

Bryon Nicholson

Affiliation Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America

Nicolle L. Barbieri

Affiliations Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America, Departamento de Biofísica, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Brasil

Subhashinie Kariyawasam

Affiliation Department of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania, United States of America

Yaping Feng

Affiliation Laurence H. Baker Center for Bioinformatics and Biological Statistics, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America

Catherine M. Logue

Affiliation Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America

Lisa K. Nolan

Affiliation Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America

Ganwu Li

liganwu@iastate.edu

Affiliation Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine, College of Veterinary Medicine, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: WC GL. Performed the experiments: WC YW GD BN NLB SK. Analyzed the data: WC CML LKN GL. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: YF. Wrote the paper: WC GL.