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Journal of Virology, November 2009, p. 11318-11329, Vol. 83, No. 21
0022-538X/09/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/JVI.02616-08
Copyright © 2009, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
Coinfection of Ugandan Red Colobus (Procolobus [Piliocolobus] rufomitratus tephrosceles) with Novel, Divergent Delta-, Lenti-, and Spumaretroviruses 
Tony L. Goldberg,1,7*
David M. Sintasath,2
Colin A. Chapman,3,4,7
Kenneth M. Cameron,4
William B. Karesh,4
Shaohua Tang,5
Nathan D. Wolfe,6
Innocent B. Rwego,7
Nelson Ting,8 and
William M. Switzer5
Department of Pathobiological Sciences, School of Veterinary Medicine, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin 53706,1 Department of International Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland 21205,2 Department of Anthropology and McGill School of Environment, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec H3A 2T7, Canada,3 Wildlife Conservation Society, 2300 Southern Boulevard, Bronx, New York 10460,4 Laboratory Branch, Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention, National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia 30333,5 Global Viral Forecasting Initiative, San Francisco, California 94104, and Program in Human Biology, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305,6 Department of Zoology, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda,7 Department of Anthropology and Roy J. Carver Center for Comparative Genomics, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 522428
Received 18 December 2008/ Accepted 4 August 2009
Nonhuman primates host a plethora of potentially zoonotic microbes, with simian retroviruses receiving heightened attention due to their roles in the origins of human immunodeficiency viruses type 1 (HIV-1) and HIV-2. However, incomplete taxonomic and geographic sampling of potential hosts, especially the African colobines, has left the full range of primate retrovirus diversity unexplored. Blood samples collected from 31 wild-living red colobus monkeys (Procolobus [Piliocolobus] rufomitratus tephrosceles) from Kibale National Park, Uganda, were tested for antibodies to simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV), simian T-cell lymphotrophic virus (STLV), and simian foamy virus (SFV) and for nucleic acids of these same viruses using genus-specific PCRs. Of 31 red colobus tested, 22.6% were seroreactive to SIV, 6.4% were seroreactive to STLV, and 97% were seroreactive to SFV. Phylogenetic analyses of SIV polymerase (pol), STLV tax and long terminal repeat (LTR), and SFV pol and LTR sequences revealed unique SIV and SFV strains and a novel STLV lineage, each divergent from corresponding retroviral lineages previously described in Western red colobus (Procolobus badius badius) or black-and-white colobus (Colobus guereza). Phylogenetic analyses of host mitochondrial DNA sequences revealed that red colobus populations in East and West Africa diverged from one another approximately 4.25 million years ago. These results indicate that geographic subdivisions within the red colobus taxonomic complex exert a strong influence on retroviral phylogeny and that studying retroviral diversity in closely related primate taxa should be particularly informative for understanding host-virus coevolution.
* Corresponding author. Mailing address: University of Wisconsin-Madison, School of Veterinary Medicine, Department of Pathobiological Sciences, 2015 Linden Drive, Madison, WI 53706. Phone: (608) 890-2618. Fax: (608) 263-0438. E-mail: tgoldberg{at}vetmed.wisc.edu
Published ahead of print on 19 August 2009.
Journal of Virology, November 2009, p. 11318-11329, Vol. 83, No. 21
0022-538X/09/$08.00+0 doi:10.1128/JVI.02616-08
Copyright © 2009, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.
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