Context
- Virus
A virus is one type of microscopic parasite that infects cells in biological organisms.
- Orthomyxoviridae
The Orthomyxoviridae are a family of RNA viruses which infect vertebrates. It includes those viruses which cause influenza. Viruses of this family contain 7 to 8 segments of linear negative-sense single-stranded RNA.
- Influenza virus
"Influenza virus" refers to a subset of Orthomyxoviridae that create influenza. This taxonomic category is not based on phylogenetics.
- Influenza A virus
Influenza A viruses have 10 genes on eight separate RNA molecules, which, for the reasons mentioned above, are named PB2, PB1, PA, HA, NP, NA, M, and NS. HA, NA, and M specify the structure of proteins that are most medically relevant as targets for antiviral drugs and antibodies. (An eleventh recently discovered gene called PB1-F2 sometimes creates a protein but is absent from some influenza virus isolates.) This segmentation of the influenza genome facilitates genetic recombination by segment reassortment in hosts who are infected with two different influenza viruses at the same time. Influenza A virus is the only species in the Influenzavirus A genus of the Orthomyxoviridae family and are negative sense, single-stranded, segmented RNA viruses.
"The influenza virus RNA polymerase is a multifunctional complex composed of the three viral proteins PB1, PB2 and PA, which, together with the viral nucleoprotein NP, form the minimum complement required for viral mRNA synthesis and replication."
Read more about this topic: H5N1 Genetic Structure
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