Intragenic recombination as a mechanism of genetic diversity in bluetongue virus.
Bluetongue (BT), caused by Bluetongue virus (BTV), is an economically important disease affecting sheep, deer, cattle, and goats. Since 1998, a series of BT outbreaks have spread across much of southern and central Europe. To study why the epidemiology of the virus happens to change, it is important to fully know the mechanisms resulting in its genetic diversity. Gene mutation and segment reassortment have been considered as the key forces driving the evolution of BTV. However, it is still unknown whether intragenic recombination can occur and contribute to the process in the virus. We present here several BTV groups containing mosaic genes to reveal that intragenic recombination can take place between the virus strains and play a potential role in bringing novel BTV lineages.
He
Cheng-Qiang
CQ
School of Biological Science and Technology, Central South University, Changsha, China.
Ding
Nai-Zheng
NZ
He
Mei
M
Li
Shan-Ni
SN
Wang
Xing-Ming
XM
He
Hong-Bin
HB
Liu
Xin-Fa
XF
Guo
Hong-Shan
HS
D000818:Animals; D001819:Bluetongue / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000821:virology*; D001820:Bluetongue virus / Q000235:genetics*; D014644:Genetic Variation; D011995:Recombination, Genetic; D012418:Ruminants