Molecular epidemiology and pathogenesis of ruminant herpesviruses including bovine, buffalo and caprine herpesviruses 1 and bovine encephalitis herpesvirus

SUMMARY Restriction endonuclease DNA fingerprints of herpesviruses isolated from 3 unrelated epidemics of bovine encephalitis are similar to each other and totally different from bovine herpesvirus 1 (BHVl). Herpesviruses, antigenically related to BHV1, isolated from goats and buffalo have distinct DNA fingerprints. We propose that bovine encephalitis herpesvirus is prototypic of a new bovine herpesvirus type and that alphaherpesviruses from individual ruminant species are species specific.