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Journal of Virology, November 2000, p. 10785-10789, Vol. 74, No. 22
Abteilung für Virologie, Institut
für Medizinische Mikrobiologie und Hygiene,
Universitätsklinikum Freiburg, D-79008 Freiburg, Germany
Received 22 March 2000/Accepted 15 August 2000
Thogoto virus (THOV) is a tick-transmitted
orthomyxovirus with a segmented, negative-stranded RNA genome.
In this study, we investigated the coding strategy of RNA segment 6 and
found that it contains 956 nucleotides and codes for the matrix (M)
protein. The full-length cDNA contains a single, long reading frame
that lacks a stop codon but has coding capacity for a putative 35-kDa protein. In contrast, the M protein of THOV has an apparent molecular mass of 29 kDa as assessed by polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. Therefore, we investigated the possibility of posttranscriptional processing of segment 6 transcripts by reverse transcription-PCR and
identified a spliced mRNA that contains a stop codon and is translated into the 29-kDa M protein. Interestingly, the nontemplated UGA stop codon is generated by the splicing event itself. Thus, the
unusual M coding strategy of THOV resembles that of Influenza C
virus.
0022-538X/00/$04.00+0
Copyright © 2000, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
Thogoto Virus Matrix Protein Is Encoded by a
Spliced mRNA

*
Corresponding author. Mailing address: Abteilung
für Virologie, Institut für Medizinische Mikrobiologie und
Hygiene, Universitätsklinikum Freiburg, D-79008
Freiburg, Germany. Phone: 49-761-2036623. Fax: 49-761-2036562. E-mail:
KOCHS{at}UKL.UNI-FREIBURG.DE.
Present address: Institute of Virology, University of Glasgow,
Glasgow G11 5JR, United Kingdom.
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