Molecular characterization of echovirus 12 strains isolated from healthy children in China

Human echovirus 12 (E-12) belongs to the enterovirus B species. To date, only one full-length genome sequence of E-12 (prototype strain Travis) is available in the GenBank database. This study determined the complete sequence of three E-12 strains, which were isolated from the stools of three healthy children in Yunnan, China, in 2013. We revealed that the three Yunnan E-12 strains had only 80.8-80.9% nucleotide identity and 96.4-96.8% amino acid identity with the Travis strain based on pairwise comparisons of the complete genome nucleotide and amino acid sequences. The three Yunnan strains shared 99.7% nucleotide identity and 99.1-99.5% amino acid similarity. Phylogenetic and similarity plot analyses showed that intertypic recombination occurred in the non-structural regions of the three Yunnan E-12 strains. This is the first report of the complete genome sequence of E-12 in China and it enriches the complete genome sequences of E-12 in the GenBank database.