Cardiovirus is a genus within the family Picornaviridae. The genus is comprised of two species Encephalomyocarditis virus and Theilovirus. Encephalomyocarditis virus has only one serotype (of the same name), while Theilovirus consists of four viruses which are probably serologically distinct; these are Theiler's murine enceaphalomyelitis virus (TMEV), Vilyuisk human encephalomyelitis virus (VHEV), a Theiler-like virus (TLV) of rats (which has yet to be named) and Saffold virus (SAF-V). Cardioviruses infect vertebrates. The virion is non-enveloped and contains a strand of positive sense, single stranded RNA. The virion shows icosahedral symmetry and is around 30 nm in diameter. The 3? end of the genome encodes a polyA tail while the 5? end encodes a genome linked protein.

In the case of encephalomyocarditis virus, the virus can cause encephalitis and myocarditis, mostly in rodents, which are natural hosts. The virus is transmitted from rodents to other animals. Severe epidemics have been seen in swine and elephants.^[1]

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