Identification of diverse groups of endogenous gammaretroviruses in mega- and microbats.
A previous phylogenetic study suggested that mammalian gammaretroviruses may have originated in bats. Here we report the discovery of RNA transcripts from two putative endogenous gammaretroviruses in frugivorous (Rousettus leschenaultii retrovirus, RlRV) and insectivorous (Megaderma lyra retrovirus, MlRV) bat species. Both genomes possess a large deletion in pol, indicating that they are defective retroviruses. Phylogenetic analysis places RlRV and MlRV within the diversity of mammalian gammaretroviruses, with the former falling closer to porcine endogenous retroviruses and the latter to Mus dunni endogenous virus, koala retrovirus and gibbon ape leukemia virus. Additional genomic mining suggests that both microbat (Myotis lucifugus) and megabat (Pteropus vampyrus) genomes harbour many copies of endogenous retroviral forms related to RlRV and MlRV. Furthermore, phylogenetic analysis reveals the presence of three genetically diverse groups of endogenous gammaretroviruses in bat genomes, with M. lucifugus possessing members of all three groups. Taken together, this study indicates that bats harbour distinct gammaretroviruses and may have played an important role as reservoir hosts during the diversification of mammalian gammaretroviruses.
Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics, Department of Biology, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA.
Jie
J
Cui
Department of Medicine, Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria, 3004, Australia.|Department of Microbiology, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, 3168, Australia.|Retroviral Biology and Antivirals Laboratory, Centre for Virology, Burnet Institute, Melbourne, Victoria 3004, Australia.
Gilda
G
Tachedjian
CSIRO Livestock Industries, Australian Animal Health Laboratory, Geelong, Victoria 3220, Australia.
Mary
M
Tachedjian
Fogarty International Center, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20892, USA.|Center for Infectious Disease Dynamics, Department of Biology, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA.
Edward C
EC
Holmes
Institute of Molecular Ecology and Evolution, Institutes for Advanced Interdisciplinary Research, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, PR China.
Shuyi
S
Zhang
Department of Microbiology and Immunology, The University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria 3010, Australia.|CSIRO Livestock Industries, Australian Animal Health Laboratory, Geelong, Victoria 3220, Australia.
Lin-Fa
LF
Wang
D000818:Animals; D044822:Biodiversity; D002685:Chiroptera / Q000145:classification / Q000821:virology*; D020077:Endogenous Retroviruses / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D017988:Gammaretrovirus / Q000145:classification / Q000235:genetics / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D051379:Mice; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny