NUCLEOTIDE-SEQUENCE COMPARISON OF THE VP8-ASTERISK GENE OF ROTAVIRUSES POSSESSING THE AU-1 GENE 4 ALLELE

Of the five currently recognized alleles of the human rotavirus VP4 ge ne, the AU-1 allele has captured attention because of its possible non -human origin. The 5' 750 nucleotide region of the VP4 gene, encoding the VP8 fragment amino acids (aa) 1 to 241! and the connecting pepti de (aa 242 to 247), from 13 human and two feline rotavirus strains pos sessing the AU-1 allele was highly conserved both at the nucleotide se quence (93.8 to 99.7% identity) and amino acid level (95.5 to 100 % id entity) irrespective of the year and the place of isolation or of the host species from which these viruses were isolated. This is consisten t with the hypothesis that the AU-1 allele of the VP4 gene has been ma intained in both human and feline rotavirus gene pools.