NUCLEOTIDE AND DEDUCED AMINO-ACID-SEQUENCES OF THE MATRIX (M) AND FUSION (F) PROTEIN GENES OF CETACEAN MORBILLIVIRUSES ISOLATED FROM A PORPOISE AND A DOLPHIN

Morbilliviruses have been isolated from stranded dolphins and porpoise s. The present paper describes the cloning and sequencing of the porpo ise morbillivirus (PMV) F gene and of the dolphin morbillivirus (DMV) M and F genes and their flanking regions. The gene order of the DMV ge nome appeared to be identical to that of other morbilliviruses. A geno mic untranslated region of 837 nucleotides was found between the trans lated DMV M and F gene regions. The predicted DMV M protein were highl y conserved with those of other morbilliviruses. Both the deduced PMV and DMV F-0 proteins exhibited three major hydrophobic regions as well as a cysteine rich region, a leucine zipper motif and a cleavage moti f allowing cleavage of the F-0 protein into F-1 and F-2 subunits. Appa rently the DMV F-0 cleavage motif was not modified by adaptation of DM V to Vero cells. The predicted PMV and DMV F proteins were 94% identic al. Comparisons with the corresponding sequences of other morbilliviru ses demonstrated that the cetacean morbillivirus does not derive from any known morbillivirus but represents an independent morbillivirus li neage.