A homolog of interleukin-10 is encoded by the poxvirus orf virus.
A gene encoding a polypeptide with homology to interleukin-10 ( IL-10) has been discovered in the genome of orf virus (OV) strain NZ2, a parapoxvirus that infects sheep, goats, and humans. The predicted polypeptide sequence shows high levels of amino acid identity to IL-10 of sheep (80%), cattle (75%), humans (67%), and mice (64%), as well as IL-10-like proteins of Epstein-Barr virus (63%) and equine herpesvirus (67%). The C-terminal region, comprising two-thirds of the OV protein, is identical to ovine IL-10, which suggests that this gene has been captured from its host sheep during the evolution of OV. The IL-10-like gene is transcribed early. Conditioned medium from COS cells transfected with a eukaryotic expression vector containing the OV IL-10-like gene showed the same biological activity as ovine IL-10 in a murine thymocyte proliferation assay. OV IL-10 is likely to be important in immune evasion by OV, since IL-10 is a multifunctional cytokine that has inhibitory effects on nonspecific immunity and Th1 effector function.[1]References
- A homolog of interleukin-10 is encoded by the poxvirus orf virus. Fleming, S.B., McCaughan, C.A., Andrews, A.E., Nash, A.D., Mercer, A.A. J. Virol. (1997) [Pubmed]
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