Scientific Publications by FDA Staff

J Virol 2010 Jan;84(2):1189-92

Identification of viral microRNAs expressed in human sacral ganglia latently infected with herpes simplex virus 2.

Umbach JL, Wang K, Tang S, Krause PR, Mont EK, Cohen JI, Cullen BR

Deep sequencing of small RNAs isolated from human sacral ganglia latently infected with herpes simplex virus 2 (HSV-2) was used to identify HSV-2 microRNAs (miRNAs) expressed during latent infection. This effort resulted in the identification of five distinct HSV-2 miRNA species, two of which, miR-H3/miR-I and miR-4/miR-II, have been previously reported. Three novel HSV-2 miRNAs were also identified, two of which, miR-H7 and miR-H9, are derived from the latency-associated transcript (LAT) and are located antisense to the viral transcript encoding transactivator ICP0. A third novel HSV-2 miRNA, miR-H10, is encoded within the UL region of the genome, 3' to the UL15 open reading frame, and is presumably excised from a novel, latent HSV-2 transcript distinct from LAT.