BRIEF REPORT A novel gammaherpesvirus isolated from a black-tailed prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus) Brandy Nagamine • Leandro Jones • Christian Tellgren-Roth • Jacqueline Cavender • Ana C. Bratanich Received: 23 February 2011 / Accepted: 6 May 2011 / Published online: 1 June 2011 Ó Springer-Verlag 2011 Abstract A new gammaherpesvirus, tentatively named cynomys herpesvirus 1 (CynGHV-1), was isolated from a black-tailed prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus). Cyn- GHV-1 replicated cytopathogenically to moderate titers in various cell lines. Ten kb of the CynGHV-1 genome was sequenced using degenerate PCR and genomic cloning. Sequence similarities were found to different genes from known gammaherpesviruses. Phylogenetic analysis sug- gested that CynGHV-1 was in fact a novel virus closely related to representatives of different genera and unclassi- fied members of the subfamily Gammaherpesvirinae. However, CynGHV-1 could not be assigned to any par- ticular genus and therefore remains unclassified. Keywords Gammaherpesvirus Á Prairie dog Á Novel virus Introduction Gammaherpesvirinae is a growing herpesvirus subfamily containing many members of interest for human/veterinary medicine and biomedical research. Gammaherpesviruses have been isolated and characterized in humans, various primates, ruminants, rodents, sea mammals and other ani- mal species [14]. Some infections are not associated with clinical disease, but others have been associated with or are the direct cause of a variety of medical conditions [1]. Identification of potential new members of this subfamily [23] has sometimes been done in conjunction with ampli- fication of conserved glycoprotein regions [3]. Classifica- tion of these unknown herpesviruses relies mainly on sequence comparison of these short segments, since these are the only data available. Isolation of many of these newly identified herpesviruses has not been accomplished. Furthermore, many of the known gammaherpesviruses are difficult to propagate in vitro, hindering detection as well as studies on latency and pathogenesis. In this paper, we describe a new, still unclassified gammaherpesvirus iso- lated from black-tailed prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus) that is easily propagated in cell culture. In 2003, a young adult female black-tailed prairie dog (Cynomys ludovicianus) was trapped in Denver, CO, and was brought dead and partially eaten to the Wyoming State Veterinary Laboratory, a diagnostic facility located at the The GenBank/EMBL/DDBJ accession numbers for the sequences reported in this paper are EU863271-863275 and EU863200. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00705-011-1024-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. B. Nagamine Á J. Cavender Á A. C. Bratanich Department of Veterinary Science, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY 82070, USA C. Tellgren-Roth Center for Rural Health Research and Education, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY 82070, USA Present Address: C. Tellgren-Roth Rudbecklaboratoriet, Department of Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, 751 85 Uppsala, Sweden L. Jones Division of Molecular Biology, Estacio ´n de Fotobiologı ´a Playa Unio ´n, CC 15, 9103 Playa Unio ´n, Chubut, Argentina Present Address: A. C. Bratanich (&) Ca ´tedra de Virologı ´a, Facultad de Ciencias Veterinarias, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Avenida Chorroarin 280, 1427 Buenos Aires, Argentina e-mail: abratanich@fvet.uba.ar 123 Arch Virol (2011) 156:1835–1840 DOI 10.1007/s00705-011-1024-x