title: HTLV-I from Iranian Mashhadi Jews in Israel is phylogenetically related to that of Japan, India, and South America rather than to that of Africa and Melanesia.
abstract: A new endemic focus of human T-lymphotropic virus type I (HTLV-I) was recently reported among Mashhadi Jews, a group of immigrants from northeastern Iran to Israel. We extracted DNAs from fresh peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) and/or gargle mouthwash from 10 HTLV-I carriers, who consisted of members of one family, and HTLV-I-associated myelopathy (HAM) and adult T-cell leukemia (ATL) patients. Long terminal repeat (LTR) regions of proviral DNAs were sequenced and analyzed phylogenetically. In a phylogenetic tree, all the Mashhadi HTLV-I isolates belonged to subtype A, one of the three subtypes of the cosmopolitan type of HTLV-I, and made a tight cluster distinct from the other isolates of subtype A from Japan, India, the Caribbean Basin, and South America. Although a few nucleotide substitutions were observed among the clones sequenced, no characteristic sequence variation was found in different disease manifestations, even in one family or different sources of DNA preparation.
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000349:Africa; D000368:Aged; D001483:Base Sequence; D002353:Carrier State; D004279:DNA, Viral; D005260:Female; D015490:HTLV-I Infections / Q000097:blood / Q000821:virology*; D015368:Human T-lymphotropic virus 1 / Q000145:classification* / Q000302:isolation & purification; D006801:Humans; D007194:India; D007492:Iran; D007557:Israel; D007564:Japan; D007585:Jews; D015458:Leukemia, T-Cell / Q000097:blood / Q000821:virology; D007963:Leukocytes, Mononuclear / Q000821:virology; D008297:Male; D008542:Melanesia; D008875:Middle Aged; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D015493:Paraparesis, Tropical Spastic / Q000097:blood / Q000821:virology; D010802:Phylogeny; D013020:South America
chemical_list: D004279:DNA, Viral