In this research project a feline papillomavirus genome was assembled from metagenomic sequencing data collected from the skin of a house cat owner.
The circular genome of strain P20 is 8,069 bp in length, has a GC content of 54.38%, and displays genome organization typical of feline papillomaviruses. The genome exhibits approximately 75% sequence similarity to other feline papillomavirus genomes. The authors assembled a complete circular feline papillomavirus genome, identified as strain P20, that was 8,069 bp in length and exhibited a GC content of 54.38%. Six open reading frames, including the E6 protein, E7 protein, E1 protein, E2 protein, late protein L2, and major capsid protein L1, which are shared among many animal papillomaviruses (1), were annotated with Prokka v1.14.5 (14) using the embedded viral annotation database and Cenote-Taker 2 v2.1 (15) (Fig. 1) (visualized with SnapGene; GSL Biotech LLC, San Diego, CA). Using BLASTn, the genome assembly showed the greatest similarity (with an average of 70.3% shared amino acids) to feline papillomavirus type 2 (family Papillomaviridae, genus Dyothetapapillomavirus) isolated from the skin of a domestic Maine Coon house cat in 2007 (GenBank accession number NC_038520). (Publisher abstract provided)