New complex recombinant genotype of hepatitis B virus identified in Vietnam.
A novel variant of hepatitis B virus was identified in Vietnam. This strain (HBV-VH24) had a novel intergenotypic recombination between genotypes A, C, and G. VH24 showed high similarity (98.3 to 98.9%) to the "aberrant strains" among Vietnamese isolates reported by Hannoun et al. (C. Hannoun et al., J. Gen. Virol. 81:2267-2272, 2000) and also had similar breakpoints of recombination. Phylogenetic analysis of the complete genome of these strains formed a separate clade. Furthermore, their pre-S/S gene-encoded seven unique conserved amino acid residues were not present in other genotypes. These findings support the designation of the new genotype I.
Tran
Thien Tuan Huy
TT
Department of Pathology, National Institute of Infectious Diseases, Toyama 1-23-1, Shinjuku-ku, Tokyo 162-8640, Japan.
Trinh
Thi Ngoc
TN
Abe
Kenji
K
D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D030561:Databases, Nucleic Acid; D016679:Genome, Viral / Q000235:genetics; D005838:Genotype; D006509:Hepatitis B / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000821:virology*; D006515:Hepatitis B virus / Q000737:chemistry / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics* / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D006801:Humans; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D014744:Vietnam / Q000453:epidemiology