ANALYSIS OF BOVINE HERPESVIRUS-4 GENOMIC REGIONS LOCATED OUTSIDE THE CONSERVED GAMMAHERPESVIRUS GENE BLOCKS

Bovine herpesvirus 4 (BHV-4) DNA sequences located outside the gene bl ocks conserved among the gamma-herpesviruses BHV-4, herpesvirus saimir i (HVS) and Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) were analysed. Twelve potential o pen reading frames (ORFs) were found. Protein database comparisons sho wed that no ORF translation products were similar to proteins encoded by alpha- or betaherpesviruses. Nevertheless, six of the ORFs were hom ologous in amino acid sequences to proteins encoded by HVS but apparen tly not to those encoded by EBV. Furthermore, the location and orienta tion of these six ORFs in the BHV-4 genome were similar to the corresp onding ORFs in the HVS genome. No genes homologous to known cellular g enes were found in the BHV-4 genome; this feature is the major differe nce between the BHV-4 and HVS genomes with regards to the overall gene content.