Genetic and antigenic characterization of measles viruses that circulated in Korea during the 2000-2001 epidemic

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http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/abstract/104536742/START

Online ISSN: 1096-9071 Print ISSN: 0146-6615
Journal of Medical Virology
Volume 70, Issue 4, 2003. Pages: 649-654

Published Online: 2 Jun 2003

Genetic and antigenic characterization of measles viruses that circulated in Korea during the 2000-2001 epidemic

Byoung-Kuk Na¹, Ju-Mi Shin¹, Joo-Yeon Lee¹, Gu-Choul Shin¹, Yoon-Young Kim¹, Jin-Soo Lee¹, Jong-Koo Lee², Hae-Wol Cho¹, Hoan-Jong Lee³, Paul A. Rota⁴, William J. Bellini⁴, Woo-Joo Kim^{1 5}, Chun Kang^{1 *}

¹Department of Virology, National Institute of Health, Seoul, Korea
²Division of Communicable Disease Control, National Institute of Health, Seoul, Korea
³Department of Pediatrics, Seoul National University College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea
⁴Division of Viral and Rickettsial Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia
⁵Division of Infectious Diseases, Department of Internal Medicine, Korea University College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea

email: Chun Kang (ckang@nih.go.kr)

^*Correspondence to Chun Kang, Laboratory of Respiratory Viruses, Department of Virology, National Institute of Health, Seoul 122-701, Korea.

Funded by:
Korean Health 21 R&D Project; Grant Number: 01-PJ6-PG5-01P22-0001
Ministry of Health and Welfare (Republic of Korea)

Keywords

measles virus • hemagglutinin • nucleoprotein • characterization

Abstract

Despite the marked reduction in the incidence of measles in Korea by the introduction of measles vaccine, a large measles epidemic occurred during 2000-2001. During the epidemic, more than 55,000 measles cases were reported and at least 7 children were dead. In this study, we analyzed the genetic and antigenic properties of 15 measles viruses that isolated during the epidemic. Sequence analyses of entire hemagglutinin (H) and nucleoprotein (N) genes of the viruses indicated that all Korean isolates had a high degree of homology (>99.8%) when compared with each other. They differed from other wild-type viruses by as much as 6.8% in the H gene and 6.5% in the N gene at the nucleotide level. The deduced amino acid variability was up to 6.4% for the H protein and up to 6.5% for the N protein. Phylogenetic analysis of nucleotide sequences and deduced amino acid sequences of the H and N genes revealed that all Korean viruses were grouped into the genotype H1. This strongly demonstrated that single genotype of measles virus has been circulated in Korea during the 2000-2001 epidemic. Plaque reduction neutralizing antibody titers against vaccine strains, Edmonston and Schwarz, and recently isolated Korean strains were measured using sera from vaccinees and recently infected children. Although sera of recently infected children demonstrated higher neutralizing antibody titers against wild-type strains than against vaccine strains, both sera neutralized both strains and the reciprocal geometric mean titers (GMTs) were not significantly different against both strains. J. Med. Virol. 70:649-654, 2003. © 2003 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Accepted: 12 March 2003

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