PreprintArticleVersion 1Preserved in Portico This version is not peer-reviewed
Determination of the Copy Number of Porcine Endogenous Retroviruses (PERV) in Auckland Island Pigs Repeatedly Used for Clinical Xenotransplantation and Elimination of PERV-C
Version 1
: Received: 3 November 2023 / Approved: 6 November 2023 / Online: 6 November 2023 (10:41:24 CET)
How to cite:
Fiebig, U.; Krüger, L.; Denner, J. Determination of the Copy Number of Porcine Endogenous Retroviruses (PERV) in Auckland Island Pigs Repeatedly Used for Clinical Xenotransplantation and Elimination of PERV-C. Preprints2023, 2023110327. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202311.0327.v1
Fiebig, U.; Krüger, L.; Denner, J. Determination of the Copy Number of Porcine Endogenous Retroviruses (PERV) in Auckland Island Pigs Repeatedly Used for Clinical Xenotransplantation and Elimination of PERV-C. Preprints 2023, 2023110327. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202311.0327.v1
Fiebig, U.; Krüger, L.; Denner, J. Determination of the Copy Number of Porcine Endogenous Retroviruses (PERV) in Auckland Island Pigs Repeatedly Used for Clinical Xenotransplantation and Elimination of PERV-C. Preprints2023, 2023110327. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202311.0327.v1
APA Style
Fiebig, U., Krüger, L., & Denner, J. (2023). Determination of the Copy Number of Porcine Endogenous Retroviruses (PERV) in Auckland Island Pigs Repeatedly Used for Clinical Xenotransplantation and Elimination of PERV-C. Preprints. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202311.0327.v1
Chicago/Turabian Style
Fiebig, U., Luise Krüger and Joachim Denner. 2023 "Determination of the Copy Number of Porcine Endogenous Retroviruses (PERV) in Auckland Island Pigs Repeatedly Used for Clinical Xenotransplantation and Elimination of PERV-C" Preprints. https://doi.org/10.20944/preprints202311.0327.v1
Abstract
Auckland Island pigs represent an inbred population of feral pigs isolated on the subantarctic island for over 100 years. The animals have been maintained under pathogen-free conditions in New Zealand, they are well characterized virologically and have been used as donor sources in first clinical trials of porcine neonatal islet cell transplantation for the treatment of human diabetes patients. The animals do not carry any of the xenotransplantation-relevant viruses and in the first clinical trials no porcine viruses including porcine endogenous retroviruses (PERVs) have been transmitted to the human recipients. PERVs pose a special risk in xenotransplantation since they are part of the pig genome. When the copy number of PERVs in these animals was analyzed using droplet digital PCR and primers binding to a conserved region of the polymerase gene (PERVpol), a copy number typical for Western pigs was found, confirming previous phylogenetic analyses of microsatellites and mitochondrial analyses showing a closer relationship to European pigs than to Chinese pigs. When kidney cells from very young piglets were analyzed, only around 20 PERVpol copies were detected. Using these cells as donors in somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT), animals were born showing a PERVpol copy numbers between 35 and 56. This data indicates that Auckland Is-land pigs have a similar copy number in comparison with other Western pig breeds and that the copy number is higher in adult animals compared with cells from young piglets. Most im-portantly, PERV-C free animals were selected and the absence of additional eight porcine viruses was demonstrated.
Keywords
porcine endogenous retroviruses; Auckland Island pigs; islet cell xenotransplantation
Subject
Biology and Life Sciences, Immunology and Microbiology
Copyright:
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
