Notes on Family: Bidnaviridae

icosahedra

Contents

• Members of this Family
• General Description
• Morphology
• Genome
• Genera in the Family
• All Known Sequences
• Curated Sequences

General Description

This family of bipartite ssDNA viruses infecting invertebrates is unique amongst ssDNA viruses. Although the viruses were once considered members of the family Parvoviridae (subfamily Densovirinae) their genomes differ greatly from those viruses in size and coding strategy.

Morphology

Virions are isometric (icosahedral), not enveloped and about 25 nm in diameter. There are two structural proteins.

Genomen

There are two linear ssDNA segments of about 6 and 6.5 kb, that are packaged separately. The complementary strands are also packaged, so that there are 4 different types of full particles. The total genome length is thus almost 13 kb (instead of 4-6 kb for parvoviruses).

Genera in the Family

There is currently only one genus:

• Bidensovirus