Dudas Gytis, Rambaut Andrew
Institute of Evolutionary Biology, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK.
Institute of Evolutionary Biology, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK,; Centre for Immunology, Infection and Evolution at the University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK and; Fogarty International Center, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA.
Virus Evol. 2016 Jan 20;2(1):vev023. doi: 10.1093/ve/vev023. eCollection 2016 Jan.
Recombination is a process that unlinks neighboring loci allowing for independent evolutionary trajectories within genomes of many organisms. If not properly accounted for, recombination can compromise many evolutionary analyses. In addition, when dealing with organisms that are not obligately sexually reproducing, recombination gives insight into the rate at which distinct genetic lineages come into contact. Since June 2012, Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) has caused 1,106 laboratory-confirmed infections, with 421 MERS-CoV-associated deaths as of 16 April 2015. Although bats are considered as the likely ultimate source of zoonotic betacoronaviruses, dromedary camels have been consistently implicated as the source of current human infections in the Middle East. In this article, we use phylogenetic methods and simulations to show that MERS-CoV genome has likely undergone numerous recombinations recently. Recombination in MERS-CoV implies frequent co-infection with distinct lineages of MERS-CoV, probably in camels given the current understanding of MERS-CoV epidemiology.
重组是一个使相邻基因座解连锁的过程，它使得许多生物体基因组内的进化轨迹相互独立。如果对其考虑不周，重组可能会影响许多进化分析。此外，在处理非专性有性繁殖的生物体时，重组能让我们了解不同遗传谱系相互接触的速率。自2012年6月以来，中东呼吸综合征冠状病毒（MERS-CoV）已导致1106例实验室确诊感染病例，截至2015年4月16日，有421例与MERS-CoV相关的死亡病例。虽然蝙蝠被认为可能是动物源性β冠状病毒的最终源头，但单峰骆驼一直被认为是中东地区当前人类感染的源头。在本文中，我们运用系统发育方法和模拟分析表明，MERS-CoV基因组最近可能经历了多次重组。鉴于目前对MERS-CoV流行病学的了解，MERS-CoV中的重组意味着它可能经常与不同谱系的MERS-CoV共同感染，很可能发生在骆驼身上。
