Abstract
BACKGROUND: Porcine parvovirus (PPV), a member of the Parvoviridae family, causes great economic loss in the swine industry worldwide. MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a class of non-protein-coding genes that play many diverse and complex roles in viral infections. FINDING: Aiming to determine the impact of PPV infections on the cellular miRNAome, we used high-throughput sequencing to sequence two miRNA libraries prepared from porcine kidney 15 (PK-15) cells under normal conditions and during PPV infection. There was differential miRNA expression between the uninfected and infected cells: 65 miRNAs were upregulated and 128 miRNAs were downregulated. We detected the expression of miR-10b, miR-20a, miR-19b, miR-181a, miR-146b, miR-18a, and other previously identified immune-related miRNAs. Gene Ontology analysis and KEGG function annotations of the host target genes suggested that the miRNAs are involved in complex cellular pathways, including cellular metabolic processes, immune system processes, and gene expression. CONCLUSIONS: These data suggest that a large group of miRNAs is expressed in PK-15 cells and that some miRNAs were altered in PPV-infected PK-15 cells. A number of microRNAs play an important role in regulating immune-related gene expression. Our findings should help with the development of new control strategies to prevent or treat PPV infections in swine.