The fit of codon usage of human-isolated avian influenza A viruses to human

[tetano]

Infect Genet Evol. 2020 Jan 6:104181. doi: 10.1016/j.meegid.2020.104181. [Epub ahead of print] The fit of codon usage of human-isolated avian influenza A viruses to human.

Luo W¹, Tian L², Gan Y¹, Chen E¹, Shen X¹, Pan J¹, Irwin DM³, Chen RA⁴, Shen Y⁵.
Author information

1 College of Veterinary Medicine, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China. 2 Guangdong Provincial Hospital of Chinese Medicine, Zhuhai 519015, China. 3 Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology, University of Toronto, Toronto M5S 1A8, Canada; Banting and Best Diabetes Centre, University of Toronto, Toronto M5S 1A8, Canada. 4 College of Veterinary Medicine, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China; Zhaoqing Institute of Biotechnology, Zhaoqing 526238, China. Electronic address: chensa727@126.com. 5 College of Veterinary Medicine, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China; Zhaoqing Institute of Biotechnology, Zhaoqing 526238, China. Electronic address: shenyy@scau.edu.cn.

Abstract

Avian influenza A viruses (AIVs) classify into 18 hemagglutinin (HA) and 11 neuraminidase (NA) subtypes. Even though H1N1 and H3N2 subtypes usually circulate among humans leading to infection, occasionally, H5, H6, H7, H9, and H10 that circulate in poultry also infect humans, and especially H5N1 and H7N9. Efficient virus replication is a critical factor that influences infection. Codon usage of a virus must coevolve with its host for efficient viral replication, therefore, we conduct a comprehensive analysis of codon usage bias in human-isolated AIVs to test their adaptation to host expression system. The relative synonymous codon usage (RSCU) pattern, and the codon adaptation index (CAI) are calculated for this purpose. We find that all human-isolated AIVs tend to eliminate GC and CpG compositions, which may prevent activation of the host innate immune system. Although codon usage differs between AIV subtypes, our data support the conclusion that natural selection has played a major role and mutation pressure a minor role in shaping codon usage bias in all AIVs. Our efforts discover that codon usage of genes encoding surface proteins of H5N1, and the polymerase genes of H7N9 has better fit to the human expression system. This may associate with their better replication and infection in human.
Copyright ? 2019. Published by Elsevier B.V.


KEYWORDS:

Adaptation; Avian influenza A viruses; Codon usage; H5N1; H7N9

PMID: 31918040 DOI: 10.1016/j.meegid.2020.104181