Genetic characteristics of breakthrough varicella-zoster virus infection during the varicella outbreaks in Minhang District of Shanghai / 中华微生物学和免疫学杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To analyze the genetic characteristics of breakthrough varicella-zoster virus infection during the varicella outbreaks in Minhang District of Shanghai in 2013-2014. Methods Samples of the varicella-zoster liquid were collected from patients with chickenpox in Minhang District in 2013-2014 and used for the extraction of genomic DNA. The open reading frame ( ORF) of 22 and 62 regions were se-quenced and further analyzed by using bioinformatics methods. Results A total of 24 samples were success-fully collected and sequenced, and all of them were wild strains. Among the 24 varicella-zoster virus strains, 23 strains were highly homologous to the parental strain ( P-Oka) and the vaccine strain ( V-Oka) , indica-ting that they belonged to J genotype. Only one strain, whose genotype was between M and E, was highly ho-mologous to the mosaic( M) CA123 strain ( M1 genotype) , indicating that it might belong to M1 genotype. Conclusion The epidemic strains of varicella-zoster virus in Minhang District were mainly J genotype. Lo-cal epidemic of M and other genotypes of varicella-zoster virus also existed. There were some gene variations in different strains of J genotype. These varicella-zoster virus strains of non-vaccine genotypes might be one of the reasons causing the breakthrough cases of chicken pox.