RESUMEN
Canine Distemper [CD] is a lethal systemic disease affecting a wide variety of terrestrial carnivores. This study was performed to survey epidemiological and molecular characteristics of the canine distemper virus [CDV] strains circulating in Iran. In this study, 19 CDV-suspected unvaccinated dogs from Northeast and center of Iran were analyzed for presence of CDV nucleoprotein [NP] gene using Nested-PCR during 2008- 2011. Different biological samples of 14 dogs were positive. The phylogenetic analysis based on partial NP gene sequences indicated the presence of two major clusters that are clearly different from vaccine strains in Iran. One cluster belongs to the European group and the other one to the Arctic group. Due to a lack of phylogenetic analysis on CDV in countries bordering Iran, except Turkey, the ancestor of Iranian sequences specially Iranian Arctic sequences could not be definitely identified. This study is the first report on phylogenetic analysis of CDV from domestic dogs in Iran