HERV-W group evolutionary history in non-human primates: characterization of ERV-W orthologs in Catarrhini and related ERV groups in Platyrrhini

Table 2 Numbers and orthologs of ERV-W sequences identified by HERV17 BLAT searches in Catarrhini primate genome sequences

	Chimpanzee	Gorilla	Orangutan	Gibbon	Rhesus
1) ERV-W loci with HERV-W orthologs in human genome	138 (67%)	132 (64%)	122 (60%)	111(58%)	69 (53%)
2) ERV-W loci corresponding to human solitary LTRs (n = 19)	1 (17)	1 (17)	7 (10)	10* (8)	14* (0)
3) ERV-W loci present in human as non-canonical HERV-W (like)	29	27	24	21	20
4) ERV-W loci lacking an ortholog in human	3 (3)	5 (4)	8 (6)	4 (2)	68 (66)
TOTAL	171	165	160	145	168

1) Number of ERV-W elements with an orthologous locus among the 211 HERV-W loci: respective percentages are given in parenthesis. Two HERV-W loci on human chromosome Y were excluded from the analysis (see text)
2) Numbers of ERV-W elements corresponding to a solitary LTR at the orthologous human position. Numbers in parenthesis indicate the proviral insertions acquired in evolutionarily older primate species that were likewise a solitary LTR in the non-human primates analyzed. “*” indicates species with initial formations of proviruses that recombined to solitary LTRs in subsequent primate species: Gibbon (5) and Rhesus (14)
3) Numbers of ERV-W elements with an ortholog in the human reference genome sequence, yet being less similar to HERV-W. Those sequences were not identified as HERV-W elements in a previous analysis [68]
4) ERV-W loci absent in the orthologous human genome positions. Numbers in parenthesis indicate the proportion of species-specific insertions

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