Negative-strand RNA viruses: the plant-infecting counterparts

KORMELINK R, GARCIA ML, GOODIN M, SASAYA T, HAENNI AL.

VIRUS RESEARCH

ELSEVIER SCIENCE BV

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2011 p. 184 - 202

0168-1702

While a large number of negative-strand (-)RNA viruses infect animals and humans a relative small number have plants as their primary host. Some of these have been classified within one family together with animal/human infecting viruses due to similarities in particle morphology and genome organization. In those cases, at least two striking differences can still be discerned between the animal/human infecting viruses and their plant-infecting counterparts which for the latter relate to their adaptation to plants as a host. The first one is the capacity to modify plasmodesmata to facilitate systemic spread of infectious viral entity throughout the plant host. The second one is the capacity to counteract RNA interference (RNAi, but also refered to as RNA silencing), the innate antiviral defense system of plants and insects. In this review an overview will be presented on the negative-strand RNA plant viruses classified within the families Bunyaviridae, Rhabdoviridae, Ophiovirudae and floating genera Tenuivirus and Varicosavirus. The genetic differences with the animal-infecting counterparts will be described in light of the above processes and evolutionary descendance.