Recent years have witnessed the discovery of several new viruses belonging to the family Arteriviridae, expanding the known diversity and host range of this group of complex RNA viruses. Although the pathological relevance of these new viruses is not always clear, several well-studied members of the family Arteriviridae are known to be important animal pathogens. Here, we report the complete genome sequences of four new arterivirus variants, belonging to two putative novel species. These new arteriviruses were discovered in African rodents and were given the names Lopma virus and Praja virus. Their genomes follow the characteristic genome organization of all known arteriviruses, even though they are only distantly related to currently known rodent-borne arteriviruses. Phylogenetic analysis shows that Lopma virus clusters in the subfamily Variarterivirinae, while Praja virus clusters near members of the subfamily Heroarterivirinae: the yet undescribed forest pouched giant rat arterivirus and hedgehog arterivirus 1. A co-divergence analysis of rodent-borne arteriviruses confirms that they share similar phylogenetic patterns with their hosts, with only very few cases of host shifting events throughout their evolutionary history. Overall, the genomes described here and their unique clustering with other arteriviruses further illustrate the existence of multiple rodent-borne arterivirus lineages, expanding our knowledge of the evolutionary origin of these viruses.

Department of Zoology and Fisheries Faculty of Agrobiology Food and Natural Resources Czech University of Life Sciences Prague Kamýcká 129 165 21 Prague Czech Republic

Evolutionary Ecology Group Department of Biology University of Antwerp Universiteitsplein 1 2610 Wilrijk Belgium

Institute of Vertebrate Biology The Czech Academy of Sciences Květná 8 603 65 Brno Czech Republic

Laboratory of Clinical and Epidemiological Virology Department of Microbiology Immunology and Transplantation Rega Institute for Medical Research KU Leuven Herestraat 49 Box 1040 3000 Leuven Belgium

OD Taxonomy and Phylogeny Royal Institute of Natural Sciences Vautierstreet 29 1000 Brussels Belgium

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