PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Utsav Pandey
AU  - Andrew S. Bell
AU  - Daniel Renner
AU  - David A. Kennedy
AU  - Jacob Shreve
AU  - Chris L. Cairns
AU  - Matthew J. Jones
AU  - Patricia A. Dunn
AU  - Andrew F. Read
AU  - Moriah L. Szpara
TI  - DNA from dust: comparative genomics of vaccine-break virus in the field
AID  - 10.1101/039479
DP  - 2016 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 039479
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/06/16/039479.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/06/16/039479.full
AB  - The intensification of the poultry industry over the last sixty years facilitated the evolution of increased virulence and vaccine breaks in Marek’s disease virus (MDV). Full genome sequences are essential for understanding why and how this evolution occurred, but what is known about genome-wide variation in MDV comes from laboratory culture. To rectify this, we developed methods for obtaining high quality genome sequences direct from field samples without the need for sequence-based enrichment strategies prior to sequencing. We found that viral genomes from adjacent field sites had high levels of overall DNA identity, and despite strong evidence of purifying selection, had coding variations in proteins associated with virulence and manipulation of host immunity. Our methods empower ecological field surveillance, make it possible to determine the basis of viral virulence and vaccine breaks, and can be used to obtain full genomes from clinical samples of other large DNA viruses, known and unknown.