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ARS Home » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #138396
Title: MANIPULATION OF MAREK'S DISEASE VIRUS GENOME TO STUDY THE ROLE OF UNIQUE GENES IN REPLICATION AND TRANSFORMATION

Author
item Reddy, Sanjay

Submitted to: Workshop on Molecular Pathogenesis of Marek's Disease and Avian Immunology
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 10/6/2002
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: A very virulent strain of Marek's disease virus (MDV) was previously rescued from five overlapping cosmid DNA fragments. To study the utility of these overlapping cosmid clones, unique MDV genes were knocked out. The gene deletion mutants were shown to grow with similar kinetics as parental virus. Using Southern blot analysis it was shown that there was no major rearrangements in the genome of the recombinant viruses. These viruses were inoculated into chickens to study their role in early cytolytic infection, transformation, and reactivation from lymphocytes. The cosmid technology to introduce mutations into pathogenic strain was shown to be an important tool to study the genes involved in pathogenesis.