A new species of mesonivirus from the Northern Territory, Australia

PLoS One. 2014 Mar 26;9(3):e91103. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0091103. eCollection 2014.

Abstract

Here we describe Casuarina virus (CASV), a new virus in the family Mesoniviridae. This is the first report of a mesonivirus in Australia, which extends the geographical range of this virus family to 3 continents. The virus was isolated in 2010 from Coquillettidia xanthogaster mosquitoes during surveillance in the suburbs of Darwin, the capital of the Northern Territory. Cryo-electron microscopy of the CASV virions revealed spherical particles of 65 nm in size with large club-shaped projections of approximately 15 nm in length. The new virus was most closely related to Alphamesonivirus 1, the only currently recognized species in the family. In 2013 a further 5 putative new mesonivirus species were described: Hana, Méno, Nsé, Moumo and Dak Nong viruses. The evolutionary distance between CASV and two of its closest relatives, Cavally and Hana viruses (Jones-Taylor-Thornton distance of 0.151 and 0.224, respectively), along with its isolation from a different genus of mosquitoes captured on a separate continent indicate that CASV is a new species.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Animals
  • Cell Line
  • Computer Simulation
  • Cryoelectron Microscopy
  • Culicidae / cytology
  • Culicidae / ultrastructure
  • Culicidae / virology
  • Nidovirales / isolation & purification*
  • Northern Territory
  • Phylogeny
  • Protein Structure, Tertiary
  • RNA-Dependent RNA Polymerase / metabolism
  • Sequence Homology, Amino Acid
  • Species Specificity
  • Viral Proteins / chemistry
  • Viral Proteins / metabolism
  • Virion / ultrastructure
  • Virus Replication

Substances

  • Viral Proteins
  • RNA-Dependent RNA Polymerase

Grants and funding

This work was partially funded by an Australian Infectious Diseases Research Centre support grant and by the Australian Research Council (DP120103994). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.