Analysis of the nucleotide sequence of the guinea pig cytomegalovirus (GPCMV) genome

Mark R Schleiss,Xiaohong Cui,Alistair Mcgregor,K Yeon Choi,Shailesh V Date,Michael A Mcvoy

doi:10.1186/1743-422x-5-139

Mark R Schleiss, Xiaohong Cui + Show 4 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1186/1743-422x-5-139

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Abstract

In this report we describe the genomic sequence of guinea pig cytomegalovirus (GPCMV) assembled from a tissue culture-derived bacterial artificial chromosome clone, plasmid clones of viral restriction fragments, and direct PCR sequencing of viral DNA. The GPCMV genome is 232,678 bp, excluding the terminal repeats, and has a GC content of 55%. A total of 105 open reading frames (ORFs) of > 100 amino acids with sequence and/or positional homology to other CMV ORFs were annotated. Positional and sequence homologs of human cytomegalovirus open reading frames UL23 through UL122 were identified. Homology with other cytomegaloviruses was most prominent in the central ~60% of the genome, with divergence of sequence and lack of conserved homologs at the respective genomic termini. Of interest, the GPCMV genome was found in many cases to bear stronger phylogenetic similarity to primate CMVs than to rodent CMVs. The sequence of GPCMV should facilitate vaccine and pathogenesis studies in this model of congenital CMV infection.

Highlights

Guinea pig cytomegalovirus (GPCMV) serves as a useful model of congenital infection, due to the ability of the virus to cross the placenta and infect the fetus in utero [13]
We recently reported the construction and preliminary sequence map of a GPCMV bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) clone maintained in E. coli [12,13], and this clone was used as an initial template for sequence analysis of the full GPCMV genome
Of the open reading frames (ORFs) so identified, 104 had sequence and/or positional homology to one or more ORFs encoded by human (HCMV), murine (MCMV), rat (RCMV), rhesus (RhCMV), chimpanzee (CCMV), or tupaia herpesvirus (THV) cytomegaloviruses (Table 1)

Summary

Introduction

Guinea pig cytomegalovirus (GPCMV) serves as a useful model of congenital infection, due to the ability of the virus to cross the placenta and infect the fetus in utero [13]. Of the ORFs so identified, 104 had sequence and/or positional homology to one or more ORFs encoded by human (HCMV), murine (MCMV), rat (RCMV), rhesus (RhCMV), chimpanzee (CCMV), or tupaia herpesvirus (THV) cytomegaloviruses (Table 1).

Results

Conclusion