Research

Evidence of recombination in quasispecies populations of a Hepatitis C Virus patient undergoing anti-viral therapy

María P Moreno¹ , Didier Casane² , Lilia López¹ and Juan Cristina¹

¹  Laboratorio de Virología Molecular, Centro de Investigaciones Nucleares, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad de la República, Iguá 4225, 11400 Montevideo, Uruguay

²  Laboratoire Evolution Génomes et Spéciation (UPR9034), CNRS, 91198 Gif-sur-Yvette, France

author email corresponding author email

Virology Journal 2006, 3:87doi:10.1186/1743-422X-3-87

Published:	24 October 2006

Abstract

Background/Aim

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) has been the subject of intense research and clinical investigation as its major role in human disease has emerged. HCV circulates in vivo as a complex population of different but closely related viral variants, commonly referred to as a quasispecies. The extent to which recombination plays a role in the evolution of HCV quasispecies when patients are undergoing anti-viral therapy is currently unknown. In order to gain insight into these matters, we have performed a phylogenetic analysis of HCV quasispecies populations from six patients undergoing anti-viral therapy.

Methods

Putative recombinant sequences were identified with the use of SimPlot program. Recombination events were confirmed by bootscaning, using putative recombinant sequence as a query. Statistical support for the presence of a recombination event was done by the use of LARD program.

Results

A crossing-over event in the NS5A gene in a HCV strain recovered after four weeks of treatment was identified in quasispecies from a patient with sustained response. Putative parental-like strains were identified as strains circulating in previous weeks on the same patient.

Conclusion

Only one recombinant strain was detected in all patient quasispecies populations studied. The recombination break-point is situated on the PKR-binding region of NS5A. Although recombination may not appeared to be extensive in NS5A genes of HCV quasispecies populations of patients undergoing antiviral therapy, this possibility should be taken into account as a mechanism of genetic variation for HCV.