Retroviruses in non-humans?

[LAURENCE TILEY]

deirdre at deeny.mv.com (Deirdre) wrote:
>
> I was just meandering mentally this morning and wondered what retroviruses
> had been identified in non-humans. FELV I believe? And VEE (I know it's
> Venezuelan and Equine, but what's the second "E" stand for?)? I don't
> remember hearing this identified as a retrovirus, but for some reason I
> think it is.
> 
> _Deirdre (working towards some ideas for a master's project....)

Lots, but VEE ain't one of them. The "E" stands for encephalitis. it is a togavirus 
(or more specifically an alphavirus). Like the retroviruses it has a + sense ssRNA
genome, but does not use reverse tanscription as part of its replicative cycle.

Other non-human retroviruses are:
Visna-maedi, EIAV, CAEV, RSV,MLV,FIV, MMTV... the list goes on and on.
Physically meander to your local library, Fields virology is a good place 
to start looking if you are really interested.

Bye
LT