Genomic recombination of infectious laryngotracheitis virus (ILTV) vaccines

Abstract

Infectious laryngotracheitis virus (ILTV) is an alphaherpesvirus that causes acute respiratory disease in chickens. This disease causes economic loss in poultry industries worldwide and is a major concern for animal health and welfare. Although, ILTV vaccines are in use to control disease, biosecurity breaches and continuous evolution of the ILTV genome make outbreak prevention difficult. Genomic recombination plays a role in diversification of herpesvirus genomes and has been suggested to be an important alternative evolutionary mechanism in herpesviruses such as ILTV. In previous studies of ILTV, two new genotypes of virulent field strains were shown to be independent recombinants derived..