Related substitutions in the small segment of Old World hantavirus genome
Tiul'ko, Z.S.; Iakimenko, V.V.
Voprosy Virusologii 53(3): 28-34
2008
ISSN/ISBN: 0507-4088 PMID: 18590133 Document Number: 616667
Whether there were related nucleotide substitutions in the S-segments of the genome of Tula, Puumala, Hantaan, Dorava/Belgrad, and Seoul viruses was studied. The significance of the correlations found in nucleotide substitutions was estimated by the level of mutual information. The majority of the correlated changes were synonymous substitutions. The correlations were mostly restricted to non-synonymous substitutions sites: Tula 258 (a.a.) and Dobrava/Belgrad (56 a.a.). In the genome of Puumala, both synonymous (204, 215, and 254 a.a.) and non-synonymous (304 a.a.) changes occurred. For Hantaan virus, the related correlations were less frequent. For Seoul virus, such correlations were not revealed. Hence, for some viruses, the selection of mutation proceeded as related at several positions in a segment. The evolution of virus sequences may depend on the number of available correlations of nucleotide substitutions in the segment.