38th Annual Meeting of the Society for Invertebrate Pathology

Choristoneura occidentalis granulovirus (ChocGV), a baculovirus that infects the western spruce budworm, has been fully sequenced and analyzed. To date, ChocGV is the only GV identified containing a homologue to the apoptosis inhibitor protein P35/P49. It shared the highest aa identity with SpliMNPV P49 (27.0%), followed by SpltNPV P49 (25.7%), suggesting that it may be a P49 homologue rather than P35 homologue. A P10 homologue was also found in choc48 as it followed the general P10 model with a coiled coil region, a proline rich region, and a basic carboxyl terminal. The PEP protein in ChocGV ( choc18) also contained a P10-like motif present in other GVs (AdorGV, XecnGV, CrleGV). Choc48 (P10) exhibited 30.5% aa identity with FALPE of AmEPV. Two large intergenic spaces were found between choc21and choc22 (1.018kb) and between choc22and choc23(1.545kb). It was thought these regions should contain ORFs as homologues to CpGV ORFs and CrleGV ORFs expected in this area were missing. Intergenic spaces greater than 1kb are found in CrleGV and XecnGV, both corresponding to approximately the same region as the intergenic spaces in ChocGV. Phylogenetically, ChocGV was most closely related to CpGV and CrleGV.