Herpes simplex virus 1 miRNA sequence variations in latently infected human trigeminal ganglia

Human herpes simplex virus 1 (HSV-1) expresses numerous miRNAs, the function of which is not well understood. Several qualitative and quantitative analyses of HSV-1 miRNAs have been performed on infected cells in culture and animal models, however, there is very limited knowledge of their expression in human samples. We sequenced small-RNA libraries of RNA derived from human trigeminal ganglia latently infected with HSV-1 and Varicella zoster virus (VZV) and detected only a small subset of HSV-1 miRNA. The most abundantly expressed miRNAs are miR-H2, miRNA that regulates the expression of immediate early gene ICP0, and miR-H3 and -H4, both miRNAs expressed antisense to the transcript encoding the major neurovirulence factor ICP34.5. The sequence of many HSV-1 miRNAs detected in human samples was different from the sequences deposited in miRBase, which might significantly affect targeted functional analyses.