云南甘薯病毒的检测及主要病毒的多样性分析

[目的]明确云南甘薯病毒的种类,并对主要病毒进行遗传多样性分析.[方法]利用PCR/RT-PCR技术,对采自云南16个县、市的279个甘薯样品进行扩增、测序,对所得序列应用分子生物学软件MEGA 5进行系统发育分析.[结果]除普洱和祥云的样品中未检测到任何病毒外,其余14个县、市的123个甘薯样品中共检测到甘薯褪绿斑病毒(SPCFV)、甘薯羽状斑驳病毒(SPFMV)、甘薯卷叶病毒(SPLCV)、甘薯C病毒(SPVC)、甘薯G病毒(SPVG)和甘薯病毒2号(SPV2)等6种病毒.其中SPVG的检出率最高,达39.1％,为云南甘薯病毒的优势种,SPFMV和SPVC的检出率分别为26.9％和24.7％,而SPLCV检出率最低,仅为0.4％.在所检测的样品中未发现甘薯褪绿矮化病毒(SPCSV)和甘薯轻斑驳病毒(SPMMV).云南甘薯病毒多数为2-5种病毒复合侵染,占总样品数的31.9％,其中2-3种病毒复合侵染现象最为常见,单一病毒侵染占总样品数的12.2％.检出率比较低的SPCFV、SPLCV和SPV2未发现单独侵染现象.[结论]云南甘薯上发生的SPFMV分离物存在EA株系和O株系,未发现RC株系,另有两个分离物同EA、O、RC之间的亲缘关系均较远,有可能是一个新的株系;SPVC和SPVG分离物均可分为3个不同的组,大部分SPVG云南分离物属于Ⅰ组.     

RNA viruses in the sea

Viruses are ubiquitous in the sea and appear to outnumber all other forms of marine life by at least an order of magnitude. Through selective infection, viruses influence nutrient cycling, community structure, and evolution in the ocean. Over the past 20 years we have learned a great deal about the diversity and ecology of the viruses that constitute the marine virioplankton, but until recently the emphasis has been on DNA viruses. Along with expanding knowledge about RNA viruses that infect important marine animals, recent isolations of RNA viruses that infect single-celled eukaryotes and molecular analyses of the RNA virioplankton have revealed that marine RNA viruses are novel, widespread, and genetically diverse. Discoveries in marine RNA virology are broadening our understanding of the biology, ecology, and evolution of viruses, and the epidemiology of viral diseases, but there is still much that we need to learn about the ecology and diversity of RNA viruses before we can fully appreciate their contributions to the dynamics of marine ecosystems. As a step toward making sense of how RNA viruses contribute to the extraordinary viral diversity in the sea, we summarize in this review what is currently known about RNA viruses that infect marine organisms.     

Parallels among positive-strand RNA viruses, reverse-transcribing viruses and double-stranded RNA viruses

Viruses are divided into seven classes on the basis of differing strategies for storing and replicating their genomes through RNA and/or DNA intermediates. Despite major differences among these classes, recent results reveal that the non-virion, intracellular RNA-replication complexes of some positive-strand RNA viruses share parallels with the structure, assembly and function of the replicative cores of extracellular virions of reverse-transcribing viruses and double-stranded RNA viruses. Therefore, at least four of seven principal virus classes share several underlying features in genome replication and might have emerged from common ancestors. This has implications for virus function, evolution and control.     

Fish viruses serologic comparison of the golden shiner and infectious pancreatic necrosis viruses

High titer neutralizing antiserum to golden shiner virus (GSV) was produced in a rabbit. The GSV antiserum had significant neutralization indices in tests with the original strain of GSV and with another more recent isolate. Neutralization indices were not significant when two strains of infectious pancreatic necrosis virus (IPNV) were reacted with GSV antiserum, and neither isolate of GSV showed significant reactivity in neutralization tests with polyvalent IPNV antiserum. Our results indicate that IPNV and GSV are serologically unrelated.     

A hypercycle theory of proliferation of viruses and resistance to the viruses of transgenic plant

A set of dynamical equations for the proliferation of two typical viruses TMV and PVY has been derived from the reaction equations describing their replication, assembly and translation. These equations can be seen as the generalization of hypercycle theory to the system. The quantitative explanation on the phenomena of proliferation of plant virus and the mechanism of resistance to the disease of transgenic plant is offered. The phenomenon of specific cessation of minus-strand RNA accumulation in the proliferation of TMV, the cross-protection of plant viruses and the mechanism of resistance to viruses of transgenic plant are discussed based on the computer simulation of the proliferation of viruses and the prediction of the secondary structure of the genomic RNA.     

Seed-transmission in the ecology of nematode-borne viruses

Virus-free populations of vector nematodes can acquire tomato black ring (TBRV), raspberry ringspot (RRV) and arabis mosaic (AMV) viruses from weed seedlings grown from virus-carrying seed. When soils from fields where nematode-borne viruses occurred naturally were air-dried to kill vector nematodes and then moistened, TBRV and RRV occurred commonly in the weed seedlings that grew, but AMV occurred only rarely. Similar tests did not detect tobacco ringspot, grapevine fanleaf or tobacco rattle viruses in weed seeds in the single soil studied in each instance, although these three viruses are also seed-borne in some of their hosts. Many weed species, when infected experimentally, readily transmit TBRV and RRV to their seed, but the viruses were much commoner in naturally occurring seed of some of these species than of others. These discrepancies between the frequency of seed-transmission of viruses from experimentally infected plants and the extent of natural occurrence of infected seed seem largely to reflect the host preferences of the vectors. Infective Longidorus elongatus kept in fallow soil retained TBRV and RRV only up to 9 weeks. When weed seeds in the soil were then allowed to germinate, the nematodes reacquired virus from the infected seedlings. Some weed species were better than others as sources of virus. Persistence of these viruses in fields through periods of fallow or fasting of the vector therefore depends on a continuing supply of infected seedlings produced by virus-containing weed seeds. This is probably less true of viruses like AMV and grapevine fanleaf, which persist for 8 months or more in their vectors (Xiphinema spp.). A few seeds containing TBRV and RRV were found in soils free of vector nematodes, suggesting that the viruses are disseminated in weed seed. This probably explains how TBRV and RRV have reached a large proportion of L. elongatus populations in eastern Scotland.     

Oncolytic viruses in the therapy of gliomas

Despite the modern advances in medicine, cure for malignant glioblastomas remains an elusive goal. Both the invasive nature and the location in vital areas of the brain make this type of tumors difficult to treat surgically, while adjuvant therapy fails to bring the expected results. Frequent recurrence and invasiveness of malignant gliomas are due to the resistance of glioma stem cells to conventional radiation therapy and chemotherapy. Technological achievements in constructing recombinant viruses yielded strains with high oncolytic activity toward glial tumors. Many of these strains have passed Phase I clinical studies and proved to be highly safe. Although the approach is obviously promising, the available strains are not efficacious enough to cure the disease and need further improvement. The review summarizes the results reported for the most successful variants of oncolytic viruses that have come down to clinical trials and discusses the prospects of new approaches to viral therapy of malignant gliomas.     

Leukemia and the reducing property of viruses

Summary Investigations of native blood of healthy people and of patients with acute leukemia have shown that the disease might be caused by a strongly reducing substance, which is presumably a virus. Evidence for this conclusion was obtained mainly by electron spin resonance (ESR) studies and by the determination of the catalase activity. ESR spectra of leukemic blood revealed an additional signal not present in spectra of healthy blood. Investigation of different blood fractions has shown that this signal is caused by a species present in the leukocytes only. Addition of reduced glutathione to healthy blood immediately after blood drawing resulted in the same signal. On the contrary, oxidizing substances, such as oxidized glutathione and KMnO₄, added to the blood of leukemic patients immediately after its drawing, caused a disappearance of this signal depending on the concentration.Since the strongly reducing substance causes a reduction in the concentration of the oxidizing substances in biological systems, the H₂O₂ level should be also affected and, thus, the catalase activity, too. As expected, the activity of this enzyme in the leukemic blood seems to be considerably lower than in healthy blood.     

Mitochondria and viruses

Mitochondria are involved in a variety of cellular metabolic processes, and their functions are regulated by extrinsic and intrinsic stimuli including viruses. Recent studies have shown that mitochondria play a central role in the primary host defense mechanisms against viral infections, and a number of novel viral and mitochondrial proteins are involved in these processes. Some viral proteins localize in mitochondria and interact with mitochondrial proteins to regulate cellular responses. This review summarizes recent findings on the functions and roles of these molecules as well as mitochondrial responses to viral infections.     

Phylogeography and population dynamics of dengue viruses in the Americas

Changes in Dengue virus (DENV) disease patterns in the Americas over recent decades have been attributed, at least in part, to repeated introduction of DENV strains from other regions, resulting in a shift from hypoendemicity to hyperendemicity. Using newly sequenced DENV-1 and DENV-3 envelope (E) gene isolates from 11 Caribbean countries, along with sequences available on GenBank, we sought to document the population genetic and spatiotemporal transmission histories of the four main invading DENV genotypes within the Americas and investigate factors that influence the rate and intensity of DENV transmission. For all genotypes, there was an initial invasion phase characterized by rapid increases in genetic diversity, which coincided with the first confirmed cases of each genotype in the region. Rapid geographic dispersal occurred upon each genotype's introduction, after which individual lineages were locally maintained, and gene flow was primarily observed among neighboring and nearby countries. There were, however, centers of viral diversity (Barbados, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Suriname, Venezuela, and Brazil) that were repeatedly involved in gene flow with more distant locations. For DENV-1 and DENV-2, we found that a "distance-informed" model, which posits that the intensity of virus movement between locations is inversely proportional to the distance between them, provided a better fit than a model assuming equal rates of movement between all pairs of countries. However, for DENV-3 and DENV-4, the more stochastic "equal rates" model was preferred.     

The familiar and the unexpected in structures of icosahedral viruses

Viruses were the first large macromolecular assemblages to be visualized at high resolution. New virus structures continue to challenge our understanding of specificity in protein-protein "recognition". The evolution of virus structures has been even more opportunistic than previously imagined.