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Journal of Virology, May 2000, p. 4214-4219, Vol. 74, No. 9
Plant Molecular Biology Center and Department
of Biological Sciences, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb,
Illinois 60115, and Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry, Polish
Academy of Sciences, Poznan, Poland
Received 18 October 1999/Accepted 2 February 2000
Brome mosaic bromovirus (BMV), a tripartite plus-sense RNA virus,
has been used as a model system to study homologous RNA recombination
among molecules of the same RNA component. Pairs of BMV RNA3 variants
carrying marker mutations at different locations were coinoculated on a
local lesion host, and the progeny RNA3 in a large number of lesions
was analyzed. The majority of doubly infected lesions accumulated the
RNA3 recombinants. The distribution of the recombinant types was
relatively even, indicating that both RNA3 counterparts could serve as
donor or as acceptor molecules. The frequency of crossovers between one
pair of RNA3 variants, which possessed closely located markers, was
similar to that of another pair of RNA3 variants with more distant
markers, suggesting the existence of an internal recombination hot
spot. The majority of crossovers were precise, but some recombinants
had minor sequence modifications, possibly marking the sites of
imprecise homologous crossovers. Our results suggest discontinuous RNA
replication, with the replicase changing among the homologous RNA
templates and generating RNA diversity. This approach can be
easily extended to other RNA viruses for identification of homologous
recombination hot spots.
0022-538X/00/$04.00+0
Copyright © 2000, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
Frequent Homologous Recombination Events between
Molecules of One RNA Component in a Multipartite RNA
Virus

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Corresponding author. Mailing address: Plant Molecular
Biology Center, Department of Biological Sciences, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115. Phone: (815) 753-0601. Fax: (815) 753-7855. E-mail: jbujarski{at}niu.edu.
Present address: Monsanto, St. Louis, MO 63198.
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