Genetic and phylogenetic characterization of structural genes from non-B HIV-1 subtypes in Italy.

A molecular and phylogenetic characterization on env and gag subgenomic regions has been performed in our laboratory on HIV-1 variants identified in seropositive individuals residing in Italy, infected in the 1999-2001 period, and five non-B-subtype HIV-1 isolates have been described. To confirm the phylogenetic characterization and to determine the genomic organization of three non-B HIV-1 isolates (A, G, and CRF02- AG), the complete gag, pol, and gp120 ORFs (approx. 6900 bp) have been sequenced for each of them. The phylogenetic tree analyses performed on the whole sequence or on individual genes suggested, for the A and G isolates, the identification of divergent strains that do not cluster into any of the known subsubtypes. This has been further validated by pairwise distance analysis. On the contrary, the phylogenetic classification of the CRF02-AG isolate has been confirmed and an overall typical pattern of intragenomic breakpoints has been observed by a Simplot analysis. These results confirm the constant HIV-1 molecular evolution and indicate the relevance of a continuous molecular monitoring of HIV-1 isolates for the development of appropriate vaccine candidates.