Gorillas have been infected with the HERV-K (HML-2) endogenous retrovirus much more recently than humans and chimpanzees.

ABSTRACT: Human endogenous retrovirus-K (HERV-K) human mouse mammary tumor virus-like 2 (HML-2) is the most recently active endogenous retrovirus group in humans, and the only group with human-specific proviruses. HML-2 expression is associated with cancer and other diseases, but extensive searches have failed to reveal any replication-competent proviruses in humans. However, HML-2 proviruses are found throughout the catarrhine primates, and it is possible that they continue to infect some species today. To investigate this possibility, we searched for gorilla-specific HML-2 elements using both in silico data mining and targeted deep-sequencing approaches. We identified 150 gorilla-specific integrations, including 31 2-LTR proviruses. Many of these proviruses have identical LTRs, and are insertional

SUBMITTER: Holloway JR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6347686 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature