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Hepatitis E virus genotype 4 isolated from a patient with liver failure: full-length sequence analysis showing potential determinants of virus pathogenesis

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Abstract

The full-length genome sequence of a genotype 4 strain of Hepatitis E virus (HEV) (CHN-NJ-H2011) from a patient (in Nanjing, China) with liver failure has been determined. Phylogenetic analysis showed that CHN-NJ-H2011 belongs to genotype 4, subtype 4h. Comparative sequence analysis carried out on a 301-bp fragment of ORF2 showed that CHN-NJ-H2011 shares high nucleotide sequence identity (94.3–94.7 %) with porcine viruses (ch-shsw1 and Ch-estw2) isolated in the same geographical region, pointing to the strong possibility of zoonotic transmission of HEV genotype 4. A broader comparison with other genotype 4 isolates revealed 12 unique amino acid substitutions in ORF1 and three in ORF2 that might serve as signatures of disease severity for genotype 4 HEV infection.

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Acknowledgments

The authors thank Professor Malcolm A. McCrae of Warwick University, UK, for proofreading the manuscript. This work was supported by the National Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 81271827).

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Microbiology, School of Basic Medical Sciences, Peking University Infectious Disease Center, Peking University, Beijing, 100191, China

    Qiuning Bu, Xiaojuan Wang, Ling Wang, Peng Liu, Jian Han, Yonghong Zhu & Hui Zhuang

  2. Institute of Hepatology, The 81st Hospital of PLA, Nanjing, China

    Jiabao Geng & Maorong Wang

  3. Clinical Laboratory, The First Hospital of Qinhuangdao, Qinhuangdao, Hebei Province, China

    Qiuning Bu

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  1. Qiuning Bu
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  2. Xiaojuan Wang
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Ling Wang or Hui Zhuang.

Additional information

Nucleotide sequence data reported here are available in the DDBJ/EMBL/GenBank databases under the accession number JQ740781.

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Bu, Q., Wang, X., Wang, L. et al. Hepatitis E virus genotype 4 isolated from a patient with liver failure: full-length sequence analysis showing potential determinants of virus pathogenesis. Arch Virol 158, 165–172 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00705-012-1488-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00705-012-1488-3

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