Evolutionary Bioinformatics (Jul 2019)

Diversified Variants of Astrovirus MLB2 in Patients Following Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation and the Evolutionary Rates and Patterns of the Virus

  • Ke Guo,
  • Li-Li Li,
  • Qing Zhang,
  • Jie-Mei Yu,
  • Yan Ye

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1177/1176934319864922
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 15

Abstract

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We assessed the quasispecies heterogeneity of a human astrovirus MLB2 (HAstV-MLB2-YJMGK) in immunocompromised patients following hematopoietic stem cell transplantation and performed genetic and evolutionary analyses of HAstV isolates circulating worldwide. The result showed that the virus had diversified variants and a strong positive selection in the patient, indicating that such patients may be a reservoir for astrovirus. The time to the most recent common ancestor of MLB2 and classic HAstVs was around 1800 years, and it has a decline in effective population size of HAstVs in the late 100 years.