X. Jiang et al., DEVELOPMENT OF AN ELISA TO DETECT MX-VIRUS, A HUMAN CALICIVIRUS IN THE SNOW MOUNTAIN AGENT GENOGROUP, Journal of General Virology, 76, 1995, pp. 2739-2747
MX virus is a Snow Mountain agent (SMA) genogroup human calicivirus (H
uCV) identified in a Mexican child with diarrhoea. An ELISA using hype
rimmune antisera to the recombinant MX virus (rMX) capsid was develope
d to detect SMA genogroup HuCVs in stool specimens. The rMX ELISA dete
cted the prototype MX virus, SMA, and Hawaii agent (HA), but not Norwa
lk virus (NV) or Sapporo virus. Twenty-three diarrhoea stool specimens
from children attending day care centres in Norfolk, Virginia, were p
ositive by the rMX ELISA and results were confirmed by reverse transcr
iption-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR). Eight of 20 diarrhoea stool
specimens from children in the United Kingdom previously shown to con
tain small round structured viruses (SRSVs) or HuCVs by electron micro
scopy were also positive by the rMX ELISA and RT-PCR. Sequence analysi
s of the RT-PCR products showed that all the rMX ELISA-positive viruse
s belong to the SMA genogroup. These data also showed that the SMA gen
ogroup can be further divided into two subgroups: subgroup 1 includes
prototypes SMA and HA, and subgroup 2 includes MX virus, minireovirus,
Oth-25 and Bristol virus.