STRONG SEQUENCE CONSERVATION OF AFRICAN SWINE FEVER VIRUS P72 PROTEINPROVIDES THE MOLECULAR-BASIS FOR ITS ANTIGENIC STABILITY

The major capsid protein p72 of African swine fever virus (ASFV) has l ong been considered an important immunodominant antigen for serologic diagnosis. Here we describe the cloning and sequence analysis of two p 72-coding genes from ASFV strains Uganda (UGA) and Dominican Republic- 2 (DR2). Sequence comparison of these genes, together with those from two other ASFV strains (BA71V and E70), demonstrated that the p72 prot eins are highly conserved (97.8% to 100% amino acid sequence identity) in strains isolated from different parts of the world. These results support previous observations indicating that p72 is antigenically sta ble, and provide a useful molecular basis for further development of A SFV serologic tests using this important antigenic molecule.