Three novel papillomaviruses (HPV109, HPV112 and HPV114) and their presence in cutaneous and mucosal samples

Abstract

To expand our knowledge of the genomic diversity of human papillomaviruses (HPVs), we searched for new HPVs in squamous cell carcinomas of the skin (SCC) and seemingly HPV-negative, otherwise typically HPV-associated lesions. We describe the characterization of three novel HPV types. HPV109 was isolated from an SCC, HPV112 from a condyloma and HPV114 from a low-grade cervical lesion. Pairwise alignment of the L1 sequences classified HPV114 to genus alpha species 3, whereas HPV112 defined a new species in the genus gamma. HPV109 had uncertain classification because of a low and about equal similarity in the L1 gene (between 60% and 65%) to different genera. Type-specific real-time PCRs of cervical samples, a majority from women with low grade atypical cytology, (n=2856) and various cutaneous samples (n=538), found HPV114 in 1.7% (48/2856) of the genital samples, whereas both HPV109 and 112 were rare viruses found at high viral loads only in their index samples.