Complete nucleotide sequence and genome organization of a tobamovirus infecting cruciferae plants

AbstractGenomic RNA sequence of a tobamovirus infecting cruciferae plants (cr-TMV) was determined. The RNA is composed of 6312 nucleotides and contains four ORFs encoding the proteins of 122K (ORF1), 178K (ORF2), 29K (ORF3) and 18K (capsid protein, ORF4). ORF4 overlaps ORF3 by 74 nucleotides and the overlapping region can be folded into a stable hairpin structure. The 3′-terminal region of the cr-TMV RNA preceding the tRNA-like structure was shown to form six potentially stable pseudoknots