Table 2.
Characteristics of ERVs in the avian genomes
| Species | LTRHarvest | RetroTector | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elements identified | Elements with ERV domain | Full ERVs | Elements identified | Elements with ERV domain | Full ERVs | |||||
| POL | GAG | ENV | POL | GAG | ENV | |||||
| Budgerigar | 523 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 960 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 |
| Chicken | 788 | 22 | 31 | 3 | 1 | 887 | 30 | 41 | 6 | 1 |
| Medium ground finch | 1301 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1068 | 5 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Turkey | 523 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 293 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Zebra finch | 6220 | 13 | 12 | 9 | 0 | 3388 | 53 | 24 | 38 | 0 |
The LTRs identified by LTRHarvest and RetroTector programs were aligned with the ENV, GAG, and POL amino acid sequences of reference ERVs of avian genomes. The elements with the conserved ENV (>480 aa), or GAG (>500 aa), or POL (>800 aa) domain of ERV were retained. The ERVs containing all three domains were designated as full ERVs