This disease that is threatening to wipe out bat species across North America.
ScienceDaily (Feb. 5, 2011) — Conservationists across the United States are racing to discover a solution to White-Nose Syndrome, a disease that is threatening to wipe out bat species across North America. A review published in Conservation Biology reveals that although WNS has already killed one million bats, there are critical knowledge gaps preventing researchers from combating the disease.
WNS is a fatal disease that targets hibernating bats and is believed to be caused by a newly discovered cold-adapted fungus, Geomyces destructans, which infects and invades the living skin of hibernating bats. Since 2006 about one million bats across six species in eastern North America have died from WNS, and as a result several species of bats face endangerment or extinction.
"White-Nose Syndrome was first documented in 2006 in a tourist cave near Albany, New York. Dead and dying bats were then found in four nearby caves, 30 km west of Albany," said lead author Janet Foley from the University of California, Davis. "By July 2010 G.destructans was identified in hibernating bats in 13 states as well as in Ontario and Quebec across the Canadian Border."