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Volume 26, Number 2—February 2020
Dispatch

Hepatitis E Virus in Pigs from Slaughterhouses, United States, 2017–2019

Harini Sooryanarain1, Connie L. Heffron1, Dolores E. Hill, Jorrell Fredericks, Benjamin M. Rosenthal, Stephen R. Werre, Tanja Opriessnig, and Xiang-Jin MengComments to Author 
Author affiliations: Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, USA (H. Sooryanarain, C.L. Heffron, S.R. Werre, X.-J. Meng); US Department of Agriculture, Beltsville, Maryland, USA (D.E. Hill, J. Fredericks, B.M. Rosenthal); University of Edinburgh, Midlothian, Scotland, UK (T. Opriessnig)

Main Article

Figure

Phylogenic tree of the capsid gene region of reference HEV-1, HEV-2, HEV-3, and HEV-4 strains within species Orthohepevirus A, representative HEV strains from species Orthohepeviruses B, C, and D, as well as the cutthroat trout virus in the genus Piscihepevirus. The phylogenetic analysis was performed by using MEGA6 software (http://www.megasoftware.net) and the maximum-likelihood bootstrap method based on the Tamura-Nei model (1). The figure represents a cladogram. The HEV-3abchij sequences bel

Figure. Phylogenic tree of the capsid gene region of reference HEV-1, HEV-2, HEV-3, and HEV-4 strains within species Orthohepevirus A, representative HEV strains from species Orthohepeviruses B, C, and D, as well as the cutthroat trout virus in the genus Piscihepevirus. The phylogenetic analysis was performed by using MEGA6 software (http://www.megasoftware.net) and the maximum-likelihood bootstrap method based on the Tamura-Nei model (1). The figure represents a cladogram. The HEV-3abchij sequences belonging to HEV-3 group 2 (HEV-3–2) are highlighted in gray (n = 182 sequences from slaughterhouse pigs in this study; n = 19 reference sequences from the GenBank database). The HEV-3efg sequences belonging to HEV-3 group 1 (HEV-3–1) are shown on a white background (n = 7 reference sequences from the GenBank database). Reference HEV sequences from genotypes 1/2/4 clade of Orthohepevirus A, and Orthohepevirus B/C/D clade are also shown as collapsed branches, and the cutthroat trout virus within the genus Piscihepevirus is shown as a separate clade. The HEV-3 reference sequences used in the phylogenetic analysis include HEV-3a AF082843, HEV-3b AP003430, HEV-3c FJ705359, HEV-3d AF296165–7, HEV-3e AB248521, HEV-3f AB369687, HEV-3g AF455784, HEV-3h JQ013794, HEV-3i FJ998008, HEV-3j AY115488, HEV-3 AB290312. We also included the following other HEV-3 sequences in the phylogenetic analysis, which were some of the top candidates from our initial BLAST (https://blast.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Blast.cgi) analysis: AB091394-HEV-3, AB154830-HEV-3, AB670953-HEV-3, DQ860011-HEV-3, FJ426404-HEV-3, FJ527832-HEV-3, JN837481-HEV-3, KF719308-HEV-3, KT718043-HEV-3. HEV, hepatitis E virus.

Main Article

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1These first authors contributed equally to this article.

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