title: African strains of hepatitis E virus that are distinct from Asian strains.
abstract: Partial genomic sequences of four hepatitis E virus (HEV) strains from Africa (Morocco and Tunisia) and one from Central Asia (Tashkent, Uzbekistan) were obtained. The reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction was used to amplify 5' and hypervariable regions of open reading frame 1 (ORF1) and a region overlapping all 3 ORFs. Sequence analysis of these regions revealed the African strains to be quite distinct from all known Asian strains but more similar to them than to the Mexican strain. Sequence analysis of the Tashkent strain revealed almost complete identity with another central Asian strain from Osh, Kirgizia. These results thus further confirm the geographical origin of HEV strain divergence.
authors.affiliation: Hepatitis Viruses Section, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland, USA.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Chatterjee
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tsarev
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Pillot
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Coursaget
authors.forename: S U
authors.initials: SU
authors.lastname: Emerson
authors.forename: R H
authors.initials: RH
authors.lastname: Purcell
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D017124:Conserved Sequence / Q000235:genetics; D004279:DNA, Viral / Q000235:genetics; D005243:Feces / Q000821:virology; D016751:Hepatitis E / Q000821:virology; D016752:Hepatitis E virus / Q000235:genetics* / Q000302:isolation & purification; D006801:Humans; D008251:Macaca; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D009018:Morocco; D016366:Open Reading Frames / Q000235:genetics; D010802:Phylogeny; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid; D014416:Tunisia; D014610:Uzbekistan
chemical_list: D004279:DNA, Viral