J Bacteriol Virol.  2009 Sep;39(3):165-171. 10.4167/jbv.2009.39.3.165.

Genetic Analysis of Hepatitis A Virus Isolated from Korea

• Lee KO
• Jeong SJ
• Seong HS
• Kim KT
• Hwang YS
• Kim GY
• Lee SH

• KMID: 1474159
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.4167/jbv.2009.39.3.165

Abstract

Hepatitis A virus (HAV) is one of the most important causes of acute infectious hepatitis. The aim of this study was to determine the genotypes of HAV that have been circulating in Koreans. A total of 76 sera referred to our institute for HAV genotyping from 11 Korean provinces were used for this study. Those samples were diagnosed by positive of IgM anti-HAV. HAV RNA was extracted from 150 microliter of serum, and reverse transcription PCR-sequencing was used to detect and characterize HAV RNA. Primer pairs from the VP1/2A region of the HAV were used for amplification and sequencing. HAV RNA was found in 64.5% (n = 49) of the 76 patient sera with acute hepatitis A. Forty-seven strains were genotype IIIA in a total of 49 isolated strains (95.9%, 47/49); only two strains belonged to genotype IA (4.1%, 2/49). Thirty eight genotype IIIA isolates were 100% identical to consensus amino acid sequences of the reference strain AJ299467. The amino acid change of L772F was found in two IIIA strains; other IIIA isolates showed one amino acid change. Amino acid of genotype IA was compared to reference strain L20541. K801R was found in 1 strain and Q810S in both strains. The amino acid change of K801R was the first report in Koreans. Until recently HAV genotype IA has been reported as a major circulating HAV genotype in Koreans. In the present study, the predominant HAV strain in Koreans seemed to be HAV genotype IIIA.

Keyword

Hepatitis A; Genotype

MeSH Terms

Amino Acid Sequence
Consensus
Genotype
Hepatitis
Hepatitis A
Hepatitis A Antibodies
Hepatitis A virus
Humans
Immunoglobulin M
Korea
Reverse Transcription
RNA
Sprains and Strains
Hepatitis A Antibodies
Immunoglobulin M
RNA

Figure

• 

  Figure 1. Neighbor-joining phylogenetic tree nucleotide sequences in the VP1/P2A region of H AV isolates in Korea. The tree includes reference strains L20541, L07676, L20553, L07722 and L07717 in genotype IA, L07703 in genotype IB, L07729 in genotype IIB, L07725, L0766 and AJ2994678 in genotype IIIA, L205328 in genotype IIIB, L077328 in genotype IV, L07731 in genotype VI. The horizontal bar at the bottom represents a genetic distance of 0.02.

• 

  Figure 2. Comparison of the predicted amino acid sequences of the VP1/VP2 junction region of HAV. The consensus amino acid sequences of AJ299467 for HAV genotype IIIA and L20541 for HAV genotype IA are shown on the top line of (A) and (B), respectively. “–” indicates conserved amino acid; differences are shown by the appropriate single letter amino acid code. The numbers above the consensus amino acid sequence indicate the predicted amino acid number from the start of HAV full amino acid. The numbers of the right ends indicate the number of HAV strains we found in the present study.

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