Subfamily: Repantavirinae

Genus: Reptillovirus

Distinguishing features

Hǎinán oriental leaf-toed gecko virus (HOLGV) is the only classified reptillovirus. HOLGV infects gekkonid reptiles (Shi et al., 2018). Reptilloviruses are the only hantavirids known to infect reptiles.

Virion

Virions are unknown.

Nucleic acid

Reptilloviruses have tri-segmented negative-sense RNA genomes of about 11.9 kb (small [S] segment: 1.8–2.3 kb; medium [M] segment: 3.5 kb; large [L] segment: 6.6 kb) (Shi et al., 2018, Harding et al., 2022).

Proteins

Based on sequence data only, reptilloviruses likely express three structural proteins: nucleoprotein (N), glycoprotein precursor (GPC), and large protein (L) (Shi et al., 2018).

Genome organization and replication

The S segment encodes N, the M segment encodes GPC, and the L segment encodes L (Figure 1 Reptillovirus). Reptillovirus genomic segments are expected to assume circular forms via non-covalent binding of complementary and conserved 3′- and 5′-terminal sequences.

Figure 1 Reptillovirus. Schematic representation of reptillovirus genome organization. The 5′ -and 3′-ends of each segment (S, M and L) are, by analogy to other hantavirids, predicted to be complementary at their termini, likely promoting the formation of circular ribonucleoprotein complexes within the virion.

Biology

HOLGV infects oriental leaf-toed geckos (gekkonid Hemidactylus bowringii (Gray, 1845)) in China (Shi et al., 2018). An unclassified, possible reptillovirus infects scincid reptiles (Harding et al., 2022). Replication-competent reptillovirus isolates have not yet been obtained, and hence reptillovirus biology remains to be elucidated.

Species demarcation criteria

The genus currently only includes a single species.

Related, unclassified viruses

Virus names and virus abbreviations are not official ICTV designations.

*Coding region sequence incomplete.