Revalidation and genetic characterization of new members of Group C (Orthobunyavirus genus, Peribunyaviridae family) isolated in the Americas

Nunes, Márcio Roberto Teixeira; de Souza, William Marciel; Acrani, Gustavo Olszanski; Cardoso, Jedson Ferreira; da Silva, Sandro Patroca; Badra, Soraya Jabur; Figueiredo, Luiz Tadeu Moraes; Vasconcelos, Pedro Fernando da Costa

The complete LRNA segments ranged from 6,907 to 6,979 nt in length, with an ORF that encodes an RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) of 2,248 aa, with a predicted molecular weight of 255.64 to 262.13 kDa. The unique exception is Nepuyo virus strain BeAn 10709 with a RdRp of 2,249 aa. This protein contains the conserved polymerase activity domains consisting of Pre-Motif A and Motifs A through E in position 951 to 1230 aa, as well as the N-terminal endonuclease motifs H, PD, and DxK (Fig 1) . These domains are highly conserved in negative sense RNA viral polymerases as well as other members of the Bunyavirales order and are directly involved in the polymerase function activity [25] . In addition, we observed two mismatches in the 8th and 9th nucleotide of the S segments, and another mismatch in the 9th nucleotide of the L segments, but we did not found mismatches in the UTR of M segments (S2 Fig).