FIG. 1.

Genomic organization of HEV. The scale at the bottom of the figure corresponds to nucleotides (in thousands). ORF1 encodes a nonstructural polyprotein which provides guanylyl-methyltransferase and RNA-dependent RNA polymerase activities and possibly other functions (23, 25). The ORF2 and ORF3 proteins are believed to be encoded by individual subgenomic RNAs generated during replication (44, 58). ORF2 encodes the viral capsid protein; ORF3, which contains one potential phosphorylation site, encodes a very small protein of about 123 amino acids (59). ORF3 proteins partition with the cytoskeleton, and it has been suggested that an interaction between ORF2 and ORF3 is associated with the assembly of virions (47, 50). ORF3 is also believed to interact with proteins involved in the host cell signaling pathway (24).