First detection and complete genome analysis of the Lyon IARC polyomavirus in China from samples of diarrheic cats

Lyon IARC polyomavirus (LIPyV), a newly discovered polyomavirus (PyV), was first identified in 2017 in human skin samples in the USA. Later, it was detected in several other countries in samples of human and feline origin. Our aim was to find out if the virus occurs in China. To this end, 100 fecal samples were collected from cats with diarrhea in Guangxi Province during 2016 and 2018 and tested with polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Only 2 samples that originated from two related individuals were found to be positive. Based on the sequence identity of the 240-bp PCR products, the two positive samples supposedly contained identical viruses. Therefore, only one of them, which was designated as LIPyV-GXNN01, was selected for full genome amplification, cloning, sequencing and analysis. LIPyV-GXNN01, which comprises 5,263 nucleotides, has an early region that consists of small T antigen (ST-Ag) and large T antigen (LT-Ag) and a late region coding for the VP1, VP2, and VP3 structural proteins. Moreover, the LIPyV-GXNN01 strain structural proteins share 95.9-99.4%, 97.6-99.2%, and 97.1-99.2% nucleic acid identity with the VP1, VP2, and VP3of other LIPyV reference strains, respectively. A phylogenetic analysis revealed that GXNN01 clustered together with previously reported LIPyV strain. This present study is the first report of LIPyV in China.