The disease was found to be caused by a previously unknown morbillivirus. 人们发现该疾病是由一种以前未知的麻疹病毒所引起。
CDV is belong to RNA genus morbillivirus in the paramyxoviridae family that has envelopment, a single stranded, negative sense genome of approximately 16 kb. CDV属于副黏病毒科麻疹病毒属有囊膜的负链线性RNA病毒,基因组长约16kb。基因组中包括6个非重叠基因区。