Review Orthohepevirus C: An Expanding Species of Emerging Hepatitis E Virus Variants Bo Wang 1, Dominik Harms 2, Xing-Lou Yang 3 and C.-Thomas Bock 2,4,* 1 Department of Biomedical Sciences and Pathobiology, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA 24061, USA;
[email protected] 2 Division of Viral Gastroenteritis and Hepatitis Pathogens and Enteroviruses, Department of Infectious Diseases, Robert Koch Institute, 13353 Berlin, Germany; HarmsD@rki 3 CAS Key Laboratory of Special Pathogens, Wuhan Institute of Virology, Center for Biosafety Mega-Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan 430071, China;
[email protected] 4 Institute of Tropical Medicine, University of Tübingen, 72074 Tübingen, Germany * Correspondence:
[email protected]; Tel.: +49-30-18754-2379; Fax: +49-30-18754-2617 Received: 06 February 2020; Accepted: 23 February 2020; Published: 25 February 2020 Abstract: Hepatitis E virus (HEV) is an emerging zoonotic pathogen that has received an increasing amount of attention from virologists, clinicians, veterinarians, and epidemiologists over the past decade. The host range and animal reservoirs of HEV are rapidly expanding and a plethora of emerging HEV variants have been recently identified, some of which have the potential for interspecies infection. In this review, the detection of genetically diverse HEV variants, classified into and presumably associated with the species Orthohepevirus C, currently comprising HEV genotypes C1 and C2, by either serological or molecular approach is summarized. The distribution, genomic variability, and evolution of Orthohepevirus C are analyzed. Moreover, the potential risk of cross-species infection and zoonotic transmission of Orthohepevirus C are discussed.