Flynn Peter J, Moreau Corrie S
Committee on Evolutionary Biology, The University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, United States.
Department of Science and Education, Integrative Research Center, Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, IL, United States.
Front Microbiol. 2019 May 22;10:1139. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2019.01139. eCollection 2019.
Endogenous viral elements (EVEs) can play a significant role in the evolution of their hosts and have been identified in animals, plants, and fungi. Additionally, EVEs potentially provide an important snapshot of the evolutionary frequency of viral infection. The purpose of this study is to take a comparative host-centered approach to EVE discovery in ant genomes to better understand the relationship of EVEs to their ant hosts. Using a comprehensive bioinformatic pipeline, we screened all nineteen published ant genomes for EVEs. Once the EVEs were identified, we assessed their phylogenetic relationships to other closely related exogenous viruses. A diverse group of EVEs were discovered in all screened ant host genomes and in many cases are similar to previously identified exogenous viruses. EVEs similar to ssRNA viral proteins are the most common viral lineage throughout the ant hosts, which is potentially due to more chronic infection or more effective endogenization of certain ssRNA viruses in ants. In addition, both EVEs similar to viral glycoproteins and retrovirus-derived proteins are also abundant throughout ant genomes, suggesting their tendency to endogenize. Several of these newly discovered EVEs are found to be potentially functional within the genome. The discovery and analysis of EVEs is essential in beginning to understand viral-ant interactions over evolutionary time.
内源性病毒元件(EVEs)在其宿主的进化过程中可发挥重要作用,并且已在动物、植物和真菌中被鉴定出来。此外,EVEs可能为病毒感染的进化频率提供重要的简要情况。本研究的目的是以宿主为中心采用比较方法在蚂蚁基因组中发现EVEs,以便更好地理解EVEs与其蚂蚁宿主之间的关系。我们使用一套全面的生物信息学流程,在所有已发表的19种蚂蚁基因组中筛选EVEs。一旦鉴定出EVEs,我们就评估它们与其他密切相关的外源病毒的系统发育关系。在所有筛选的蚂蚁宿主基因组中发现了各种各样的EVEs,在许多情况下它们与先前鉴定的外源病毒相似。与单链RNA病毒蛋白相似的EVEs是整个蚂蚁宿主中最常见的病毒谱系,这可能是由于某些单链RNA病毒在蚂蚁中感染更持久或内源性化更有效。此外,与病毒糖蛋白和逆转录病毒衍生蛋白相似的EVEs在整个蚂蚁基因组中也很丰富,表明它们具有内源性化的倾向。这些新发现的EVEs中有几个被发现在基因组内可能具有功能。EVEs的发现和分析对于开始理解进化时间内病毒与蚂蚁的相互作用至关重要。