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Volume 11
Issue 3
10.3390/v11030264
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Article

The Transcriptional Landscape of Marek’s Disease Virus in Primary Chicken B Cells Reveals Novel Splice Variants and Genes

by
Luca D. Bertzbach
1,†,
Florian Pfaff
2,*,†,
Viktoria I. Pauker
3,
Ahmed M. Kheimar
1,4,
Dirk Höper
2,
Sonja Härtle
5,
Axel Karger
3,* and
Benedikt B. Kaufer
1,*
1
Institute of Virology, Freie Universität Berlin, Robert von Ostertag-Straße 7-13, 14163 Berlin, Germany
2
Institute of Diagnostic Virology, Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut, Federal Research Institute for Animal Health, Südufer 10, 17493 Greifswald-Insel Riems, Germany
3
Institute of Molecular Virology and Cell Biology, Friedrich-Loeffler-Institut, Federal Research Institute for Animal Health, Südufer 10, 17493 Greifswald-Insel Riems, Germany
4
Department of Poultry Diseases, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Sohag University, Sohag 82424, Egypt
5
Department of Veterinary Sciences, Institute for Animal Physiology, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, 80539 Munich, Germany
*
Authors to whom correspondence should be addressed.
†
These authors contributed equally to this work.
Viruses 2019, 11(3), 264; https://doi.org/10.3390/v11030264
Received: 18 February 2019 / Revised: 12 March 2019 / Accepted: 13 March 2019 / Published: 16 March 2019
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Virus Bioinformatics)
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Abstract

Marek’s disease virus (MDV) is an oncogenic alphaherpesvirus that infects chickens and poses a serious threat to poultry health. In infected animals, MDV efficiently replicates in B cells in various lymphoid organs. Despite many years of research, the viral transcriptome in primary target cells of MDV remained unknown. In this study, we uncovered the transcriptional landscape of the very virulent RB1B strain and the attenuated CVI988/Rispens vaccine strain in primary chicken B cells using high-throughput RNA-sequencing. Our data confirmed the expression of known genes, but also identified a novel spliced MDV gene in the unique short region of the genome. Furthermore, de novo transcriptome assembly revealed extensive splicing of viral genes resulting in coding and non-coding RNA transcripts. A novel splicing isoform of MDV UL15 could also be confirmed by mass spectrometry and RT-PCR. In addition, we could demonstrate that the associated transcriptional motifs are highly conserved and closely resembled those of the host transcriptional machinery. Taken together, our data allow a comprehensive re-annotation of the MDV genome with novel genes and splice variants that could be targeted in further research on MDV replication and tumorigenesis. View Full-Text
Keywords: Marek’s disease virus (MDV); RNA-seq; transcriptome; splicing; polycistronic viral transcripts; primary B cells; RB1B; CVI988/Rispens; ICP0 Marek’s disease virus (MDV); RNA-seq; transcriptome; splicing; polycistronic viral transcripts; primary B cells; RB1B; CVI988/Rispens; ICP0
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MDPI and ACS Style

Bertzbach, L.D.; Pfaff, F.; Pauker, V.I.; Kheimar, A.M.; Höper, D.; Härtle, S.; Karger, A.; Kaufer, B.B. The Transcriptional Landscape of Marek’s Disease Virus in Primary Chicken B Cells Reveals Novel Splice Variants and Genes. Viruses 2019, 11, 264. https://doi.org/10.3390/v11030264

AMA Style

Bertzbach LD, Pfaff F, Pauker VI, Kheimar AM, Höper D, Härtle S, Karger A, Kaufer BB. The Transcriptional Landscape of Marek’s Disease Virus in Primary Chicken B Cells Reveals Novel Splice Variants and Genes. Viruses. 2019; 11(3):264. https://doi.org/10.3390/v11030264

Chicago/Turabian Style

Bertzbach, Luca D., Florian Pfaff, Viktoria I. Pauker, Ahmed M. Kheimar, Dirk Höper, Sonja Härtle, Axel Karger, and Benedikt B. Kaufer. 2019. "The Transcriptional Landscape of Marek’s Disease Virus in Primary Chicken B Cells Reveals Novel Splice Variants and Genes" Viruses 11, no. 3: 264. https://doi.org/10.3390/v11030264

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