Herpesviridae Simplexvirus

The Herpesviridae are a large family of enveloped DNA viruses that cause disease in several animal species, including humans. Herpesviruses have large double-stranded linear DNA genomes of 120-220kb encoding 100-200 genes. The Herpesviridae family can be subdivided into alpha, beta and gamma herpesviridae.

The simplex virus family is a subdivision of the alphaherpesviruses and mainly infect humans and non-human primates . These viruses are characterised by a much more rapid replication cycle than other herpesviruses. Human herpes virus 1 and 2 (HHV-1 and -2, also known as Herpes simplex virus (HSV) 1 and 2), are two members of this virus family that infect humans causing blisters in the skin or mucous membranes of the mouth, lips or genitals. HHV-1 and HHV-2 establish lifelong latent infection in nerve cells and can reactivate sporadically to cause recurring symptoms.

Data Downloads

This project is ongoing and data for this organism will be made available in due course.

Human herpesvirus 1 (HHV-1 or Herpes simplex virus 1) is a neurotropic alphaherpesvirus which establishes latent infection in neuronal cells and causes recurrent oral blisters upon sporadic reactivation. HHV-1 has a large dsDNA genome of 152kb and encodes at least 75 viral genes.

In collaboration with Professor Tony Minson and Dr Helena Browne at the University of Cambridge we are currently involved in full genome sequencing of wild type laboratory strains of HHV-1 and viruses which are mutated in the glycoprotein H region, impeding virus entry into cells. This project aims to determine changes in the genomic DNA sequence responsible for observed phenotypic changes in the mutant viruses.

Published Genome Data

NC_001806 Human herpesvirus 1, complete genome can be found here

Related links

• Artemis
• Viruses
• International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses
• WTSI Sequencing

Data Use Statement

This sequencing centre plans on publishing the completed and annotated sequences in a peer-reviewed journal as soon as possible. Permission of the principal investigator should be obtained before publishing analyses of the sequence/open reading frames/genes on a chromosome or genome scale. See our data sharing policy.

Sequencing enquiries

Please address all sequencing enquiries to: pathinfo@sanger.ac.uk