Transcriptome mining reveals diversity and evolution of circulating and endogenous amphibian retroviruses.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The evolutionary history of retroviruses and their impact on vertebrate evolution remains poorly understood, particularly in non-mammalian hosts. In this study, we explore retroviruses associated with Amphibia through analysis of 169 RNA sequencing datasets from 102 amphibian species. Using a BLAST-based approach, we identified retroviral transcripts from assembled transcriptomes and phylogenetically characterise both their pol and env regions to elucidate their evolutionary history.

Results

We identified the transcription of 18 novel and two previously described retroviruses with closest relatives in gammaretrovirus, epsilonretrovirus, betaretrovirus and spumaretrovirinae. Despite their differing pol phylogenies, we found that all amphibian retroviruses belong to

SUBMITTER: Harding EF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12690878 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature