Nagamine M, Suzutani T, Saijo M, Hayashi K, Azuma M
Department of Otolaryngology, Asahikawa Medical College, Asahikawa, 078-8510, Japan.
J Clin Microbiol. 2000 Jul;38(7):2750-2. doi: 10.1128/JCM.38.7.2750-2752.2000.
The polymorphism of the thymidine kinase (TK) gene of herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) was analyzed and was compared with the restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) of the whole genome to evaluate the relative efficiency of the TK gene as a potential probe for identification and discrimination of HSV-1. The effectiveness of using the polymorphism of the TK gene in classifying HSV-1 strains was comparable to that of RFLP analysis of 66 sites, suggesting that TK gene sequencing may have important applications in epidemiological studies of HSV-1.