Murine cytomegalovirus is not restricted to the house mouse Mus musculus domesticus: prevalence and genetic diversity in the European house mouse hybrid zone.

ABSTRACT:

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Murine cytomegalovirus (MCMV) is a betaherpesvirus of the house mouse, Mus musculus domesticus. It is a common infectious agent of wild mice and a highly studied pathogen of the laboratory mouse. Betaherpesviruses are specific to their hosts, and it is not known if other Mus taxa carry MCMV or if it is restricted to M. m. domesticus. We sampled mice over a 145-km transect of Bavaria-Bohemia crossing a hybrid zone between M. m. domesticus and Mus musculus musculus in order to investigate the occurrence of MCMV in two Mus subspecies and to test the limits of the specificity of the virus for its host. We hypothesized that if the two subspecies carry MCMV and if the virus is highly specific to its host, divergent MCMV lineages would have codiverged with their hosts and would

SUBMITTER: Gouy de Bellocq J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4301121 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature