A SYBR Green I based one-step real-time reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction was developed for the detection and differentiation of very virulent (vv) and classical strains of infectious bursal disease virus (IBDV). The assay showed high PCR efficiency >93% and high reproducibility with coefficient of variation less than 0.5%. When tested on characterized IBDV strains, the very virulent and classical-specific primers detected accurately only vvIBDV and classical IBDV strains, respectively. The diagnostic efficacy of the assay was also tested on 140 bursal samples from experimental infection and 37 bursal samples from cases suspected of IBD. The assay was able to detect IBDV from bursal samples collected at days 3 and 5 post-infection with the vvIBDV strain UPM94/273 and the classical IBDV strain D78. The assay was also able to detect bursal samples infected dually with D78 and UPM94/273. The melting temperature values of the amplification products from the classical and very virulent viral infection were statistically significant (P<0.05). The specificity of the assay for detecting IBDV from suspected cases was confirmed by sequence analysis of the VP2 gene. The assay showed high sensitivity since bursal samples which were negative for IBDV were confirmed by virus isolation and PCR amplification. Hence, the new assay offers an attractive method for rapid detection of strains of IBDV.
Foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) is a major cause of endemic outbreaks in Vietnam in recent years. In this work, six serotype A foot-and-mouth disease viruses (FMDV), collected from endemic outbreaks during January and February of 2009 in four different provinces in Vietnam, were genetically characterized for their complete genome sequences. Genetic analysis based on the complete viral genome sequence indicated that they were closely related to each other and shared 99.0-99.8% amino acid (aa) identity. Genetic and deduced aa analysis of the capsid coding gene VP1 showed that the six Vietnamese strains were all classified into the genotype IX from a total of 10 major genotypes worldwide, sharing 98.1-100% aa identity each other. They were most closely related to the type A strains recently isolated in Laos (A/LAO/36/2003, A/LAO/1/2006, A/LAO/6/2006, A/LAO/7/2006, and A/LAO/8/2006), Thailand (A/TAI/2/1997 and A/TAI/118/1987), and Malaysia (A/MAY/2/2002), sharing 88.3-95.5% nucleotide (nt) identities. In contrast, Vietnamese type A strains showed low nt identities with the two old type A FMDVs, isolated in 1960 in Thailand (a15thailand iso43) and in 1975 in the Philippines (aphilippines iso50), ranging from 77.3 to 80.9% nt identity. A multiple alignment based on the deduced amino acid sequences of the capsid VP1 coding gene of type A FMDV revealed three amino acid substitutions between Vietnamese strains and the strains of other Southeast Asian countries (Laos, Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines). Alanine was replaced by valine at residue 24, asparagine by arginine at residue 85, and serine by threonine at residue 196. Furthermore, type A FMDV strains recently isolated in Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, and Malaysia all have one amino acid deletion at residue 140 of the capsid VP1 protein compared with the two old type A FMDV strains from Thailand and the Philippines as well as most other type A representatives worldwide. This article is the first to report on the comprehensive genetic characterization of type A FMDV circulating in Vietnam.
In this study, we have sequenced the C-terminal part of the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV)-BNLF-1 gene encoding for the latent membrane protein-1 from tissues of EBV-positive Danish Hodgkin's disease (HD) and of Danish and Malaysian peripheral T-cell lymphomas (PTLs) and from tonsils of Danish infectious mononucleosis (IM). Our study showed that some of the 7 single-base mutations and the 30-bp deletion previously detected between codons of amino acid 322 and 366 in the BNLF-1 gene of the nasopharyngeal carcinoma cell line CAO were present in all Malaysian PTLs and in 60% of the Danish PTLs. In HD and the IM cases, the mutations were present in about 30%. The 30-bp deletion and the single base mutations occurred independently, and mutations were detectable in the majority of EBV type B-positive cases. These findings suggest that the 30-bp deletion and the 7 single-base mutations in the C-terminal part of the CAO-BNLF-1 gene do not characterize a new EBV type A substrain. Rather, some of the positions of single base mutations and the 30-bp deletion are hot spots that may have mutated independently through the evolution of EBV strains.
LMP-1, an Epstein-Barr viral (EBV) latency protein, is considered a viral oncogene because of its ability to transform rodent fibroblasts in vivo and render them tumorigenic in nude mice. In human B cells, EBV LMP-1 induces DNA synthesis and abrogates apoptosis. LMP-1 is expressed in EBV-transformed lymphoblastoid cell lines, nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC), a subset of Hodgkin's disease (HD), and in EBV-associated lymphoproliferative disorders (EBV-LPDs). Recently, focused deletions near the 3' end of the LMP-1 gene (del-LMP-1, amino acids 346-355), in a region functionally related to the half-life to the LMP-1 protein, have been reported frequently in human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-associated HD (100%) and EBV+ Malaysian and Danish peripheral T-cell lymphomas (100%, 61% respectively), but less frequently in cases of HD not associated with HIV (28%, 33%) and infectious mononucleosis (33%). To further investigate the potential relationship of del-LMP-1 to EBV-LPDs associated with immunosuppression or immunodeficiency, we studied 39 EBV-associated lymphoproliferations (10 benign, 29 malignant) from four distinct clinical settings: posttransplant (4 malignant, 1 reactive); HIV+ (18 malignant, 2 reactive); nonimmunodeficiency malignant lymphoma (ML) (7 cases); and sporadic EBV infection with lymphoid hyperplasia (7 cases). The presence of EBV within lymphoid cells was confirmed by EBV EBER1 RNA in situ hybridization or by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) analysis. EBV strain type and LMP-1 deletion status were determined by PCR. EBV strain types segregated into two distinct distributions: HIV+ (9 A; 11 B) and non-HIV (19 A, 0 B), consistent with previous reports. Overall, del-LMP-1 were found in 1 of 5 (20%) Burkitt lymphomas (BL); 17 of 24 (71%) aggressive non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (agg-NHL), and 2 of 10 (20%) reactive lymphoid proliferations. Of the agg-NHLs, del-LMP-1 were present in 4 of 4 PT-ML (100%); 10 of 15 HIV+ ML (67%); and 3 of 5 nonimmunodeficiency malignant lymphoma (ML, 60%). A total of 2 of 7 (28%) sporadic EBV-associated lymphoid hyperplasias contained a del-LMP-1. All del-LMP-1 were identical by DNA sequence analysis. No correlation was identified between the presence of del-LMP-1 and the EBV strain type observed. The high incidence of del-LMP-1 observed in agg-NHLs (71%), in contrast to the relatively low incidence observed in reactive lymphoid proliferations (28%), suggests that the deleted form may be preferentially selected in lymphomatous processes. All posttransplant agg-NHLs contained a del-LMP-1, and a similar frequency of del-LMP-1 was observed in both HIV-associated ML (66%) and nonimmunodeficiency ML (60%), suggesting that impairment of immune function alone is not a requirement for the expansion of malignant cells infected by EBV stains containing the deleted LMP-1 gene.