''Enquatrovirus'' is a genus of

bacteriophage A bacteriophage (), also known informally as a ''phage'' (), is a duplodnaviria virus that infects and replicates within bacteria and archaea. The term was derived from "bacteria" and the Greek φαγεῖν ('), meaning "to devour". Bacteri ...

s in the order ''

Caudovirales ''Caudovirales'' is an order of viruses known as the tailed bacteriophages (''cauda'' is Latin for "tail"). Under the Baltimore classification scheme, the ''Caudovirales'' are group I viruses as they have double stranded DNA (dsDNA) genomes, ...

'', in the family ''

Podoviridae ''Podoviridae'' is a family of bacteriophage in the order ''Caudovirales'' often associated with T-7 like phages. There are 130 species in this family, assigned to 3 subfamilies and 52 genera. This family is characterized by having very short, n ...

''. Bacteria serve as natural hosts. There is currently only one species in this genus: the type species '' Escherichia virus N4''. ''Escherichia virus N4'' is the type species of this genus and was originally isolated from sewers in

Genoa Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the List of cities in Italy, sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian ce ...

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

and infects ''

Escherichia coli ''Escherichia coli'' (),Wells, J. C. (2000) Longman Pronunciation Dictionary. Harlow ngland Pearson Education Ltd. also known as ''E. coli'' (), is a Gram-negative, facultative anaerobic, rod-shaped, coliform bacterium of the genus ''Escher ...

'' K-12. Recently, a number of genetically related phages were isolated, infecting '' Silicibacter'' and '' Sulfitobacter'' (DSS3ɸ2 and EE36ɸ1) as well as a number of ''

Pseudomonas ''Pseudomonas'' is a genus of Gram-negative, Gammaproteobacteria, belonging to the family Pseudomonadaceae and containing 191 described species. The members of the genus demonstrate a great deal of metabolic diversity and consequently are able ...

'' phages (LUZ7, LIT1 and PEV2)

Taxonomy

Group: dsDNA

Structure

The virus's

virion A virus is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses infect all life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea. Since Dmitri Ivanovsky's 1 ...

have

icosahedral In geometry, an icosahedron ( or ) is a polyhedron with 20 faces. The name comes and . The plural can be either "icosahedra" () or "icosahedrons". There are infinitely many non- similar shapes of icosahedra, some of them being more symmetrica ...

(T=9) heads ~70 nm and short tails (10 nm), and contain short fibers originating from the junction between the head and tail. All the phages of this genus are strictly virulent and contain a linear dsDNA

genome In the fields of molecular biology and genetics, a genome is all the genetic information of an organism. It consists of nucleotide sequences of DNA (or RNA in RNA viruses). The nuclear genome includes protein-coding genes and non-coding ge ...

(with terminal repeats) in the range of 70-75kb.

Life cycle

Viral replication is cytoplasmic. Entry into the host cell is achieved by adsorption into the host cell. Dna templated transcription is the method of transcription. Bacteria serve as the natural host. Transmission routes are passive diffusion.

RNA polymerases

A remarkable feature of this

clade A clade (), also known as a monophyletic group or natural group, is a group of organisms that are monophyletic – that is, composed of a common ancestor and all its lineal descendants – on a phylogenetic tree. Rather than the English term, ...

of phages is the use of three distinct

RNA Ribonucleic acid (RNA) is a polymeric molecule essential in various biological roles in coding, decoding, regulation and expression of genes. RNA and deoxyribonucleic acid ( DNA) are nucleic acids. Along with lipids, proteins, and carbohydra ...

polymerase A polymerase is an enzyme ( EC 2.7.7.6/7/19/48/49) that synthesizes long chains of polymers or nucleic acids. DNA polymerase and RNA polymerase are used to assemble DNA and RNA molecules, respectively, by copying a DNA template strand using base- ...

s during its infection cycle. A giant virion-encapsulated RNAP polymerase which is co-injected (early transcription), a

heterodimeric In biochemistry, a protein dimer is a macromolecular complex formed by two protein monomers, or single proteins, which are usually non-covalently bound. Many macromolecules, such as proteins or nucleic acids, form dimers. The word ''dimer'' has ...

phage RNA polymerase (middle region) and the host RNA polymerase (recognizes late promoters).

References

External links

Viralzone: N4likevirus

ICTV
{{Taxonbar, from=Q6951967 Podoviridae Virus genera