Abstract

The problem of new and reemerging diseases is the highly actual in evolutionary infectology. As to plague, there are two approaches to the problem of the recent origin of the plague microbe Yersinia pestis: molecular-genetic (MG) and ecological one. The paradigm of MG-approach is speciation of plague microbe not more then 20 000 y.a. by mode of genetic saltation (in general, by horizontal gene transfer of specific virulence plasmids pFra and pPst from environment or other bacterial species and by inactivation/deletion of nonfunctional genes) [1-3]. The MG-scenarios of the recent origin of plague assume speciation of Y. pestis from the pseudotuberculosis microbe Y. pseudotuberculosis O:1b in the populations of Microtinae species (voles) in different geographic regions: in Tibet, Caucasus, China Loss plateau or Africa (Nile valley, Angola) [4-9].