title: Murine herpesvirus 68 is genetically related to the gammaherpesviruses Epstein-Barr virus and herpesvirus saimiri.
abstract: Short nucleotide sequence analysis of seven restriction fragments of murine herpesvirus 68 (MHV-68) DNA has been undertaken and used to determine the overall genome organization and relatedness of this virus to other well characterized representatives of the alpha-, beta- and gammaherpesvirus subgroups. Nine genes have been identified which encode amino acid sequences with greater similarity to proteins of the gammaherpesvirus Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) than to the homologous products of the alphaherpesviruses varicella-zoster virus and herpes simples virus type 1 or the betaherpesvirus human cytomegalovirus. In addition, the genome organization of MHV-68 is shown to have an overall collinearity with that of the gammaherpesviruses EBV and herpesvirus saimiri. In common with these viruses, dinucleotide frequency analysis of MHV-68 coding sequences reveals a marked reduction in CpG dinucleotide frequency thus implicating a dividing cell population as the site of latency in vivo.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pathology, University of Cambridge, U.K.
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Efstathiou
authors.forename: Y M
authors.initials: YM
authors.lastname: Ho
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hall
authors.forename: C J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Styles
authors.forename: S D
authors.initials: SD
authors.lastname: Scott
authors.forename: U A
authors.initials: UA
authors.lastname: Gompels
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D001483:Base Sequence; D003587:Cytomegalovirus / Q000235:genetics; D004279:DNA, Viral / Q000032:analysis / Q000235:genetics*; D015226:Dinucleoside Phosphates / Q000032:analysis; D006564:Herpesviridae / Q000235:genetics*; D006567:Herpesvirus 2, Saimiriine / Q000235:genetics*; D014645:Herpesvirus 3, Human / Q000235:genetics; D004854:Herpesvirus 4, Human / Q000235:genetics*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D015183:Restriction Mapping; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid; D018139:Simplexvirus / Q000235:genetics; D014764:Viral Proteins / Q000235:genetics
chemical_list: D004279:DNA, Viral; D015226:Dinucleoside Phosphates; D014764:Viral Proteins; C015772:CpG dinucleotide