Infectious Virions of <i>Bombyx Mori Latent Virus</i> Are Incorporated into <i>Bombyx Mori Nucleopolyhedrovirus</i> Occlusion Bodies
Keita Tsukui,
Chihiro Yagisawa,
Shota Fujimoto,
Moe Ogawa,
Ryuhei Kokusho,
Mitsuyoshi Nozawa,
Hideki Kawasaki,
Susumu Katsuma,
Masashi Iwanaga
Affiliations
Keita Tsukui
Department of Agrobiology and Bioresources, School of Agriculture, Utsunomiya university, Utsunomiya, Tochigi 321-8505, Japan
Chihiro Yagisawa
Department of Agrobiology and Bioresources, School of Agriculture, Utsunomiya university, Utsunomiya, Tochigi 321-8505, Japan
Shota Fujimoto
Department of Agrobiology and Bioresources, School of Agriculture, Utsunomiya university, Utsunomiya, Tochigi 321-8505, Japan
Moe Ogawa
Department of Agrobiology and Bioresources, School of Agriculture, Utsunomiya university, Utsunomiya, Tochigi 321-8505, Japan
Ryuhei Kokusho
Department of Agricultural and Environmental Biology, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, The University of Tokyo, Bunkyo, Tokyo 113-8657, Japan
Mitsuyoshi Nozawa
Institute of Sericulture, Ami, Ibaraki 300-0324, Japan
Hideki Kawasaki
Department of Agrobiology and Bioresources, School of Agriculture, Utsunomiya university, Utsunomiya, Tochigi 321-8505, Japan
Susumu Katsuma
Department of Agricultural and Environmental Biology, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, The University of Tokyo, Bunkyo, Tokyo 113-8657, Japan
Masashi Iwanaga
Department of Agrobiology and Bioresources, School of Agriculture, Utsunomiya university, Utsunomiya, Tochigi 321-8505, Japan
The Bombyx mori latent virus (BmLV) belongs to the unassigned plant virus family Tymoviridae and contains a positive-sense, single-stranded RNA genome. BmLV has infected almost all B. mori-derived cultured cell lines through unknown routes. The source of BmLV infection and the BmLV life cycle are still unknown. Here, we examined the interaction between BmLV and the insect DNA virus Bombyx mori nucleopolyhedrovirus (BmNPV). Persistent infection with BmLV caused a slight delay in BmNPV propagation, and BmLV propagation was enhanced in B. mori larvae via co-infection with BmNPV. We also showed that BmLV infectious virions were co-occluded with BmNPV virions into BmNPV occlusion bodies. We propose a new relationship between BmLV and BmNPV.
