Bioinformatics Study of the DNA and RNA Viruses Infecting Plants and Bacteria that Could Potentially Affect Animals and Humans

Background: From the existing knowledge of viruses, those infecting plants and bacteria and affecting animals are particularly interesting. This is because such viruses have an ability to vertically transmit to other species, including humans, and therefore could represent a public health issue of significant proportions. Objective: This study aims to bioinformatically characterize the proteins from the DNA and RNA viruses capable of infecting plants and bacteria, and affecting animals, of which there is some evidence of contact with human beings. It follows up on our previous study “Characterization of Proteins from Putative Human DNA and RNA Viruses”. Methods: The Polarity Index Method profile (PIM), Intrinsic Disorder Predisposition (IDPD) profiles, and a Markov chains analysis of three DNA-viruses protein sequences and four RNA-viruses protein sequences that infect plants and bacteria and affect animals, extracted from the UniProt database, were calculated using a set of in-house computational programs. Results: Computational runs carried out in this work reveal relevant regularities at the level of the viral proteins' charge/polarity and IDPD profiles. These results enable the re-creation of the taxonomy known for the DNA- and RNA-virus protein sequences. In addition, an analysis of the entire set of proteins qualified as "reviewed" in the UniProt database was carried out for each protein viral group to discover proteins with similar PIM profiles. A significant number of proteins with such charge/polarity profiles were found. Conclusion: The bioinformatics results obtained at the level of the amino acid sequences, generated important information that contributes to the understanding of these protein groups.