Viral DNA is transported to the cell nucleus where host macromolecular synthesis is rapidly shutdown. This becomes the template for cytoplasmic replication. Progeny DNA is transported into the cytoplasm where large concatamers of viral DNA are formed by recombination. Transcription of very late transcripts may also take place in the cytoplasm. Concatamers are resolved into packaged lengths, possibly by a headful packaging approach.
Virions exit the cell by budding or cell lysis.
Possible recombination dependent iridovirus replication. In this this way these 3' ends serve as primers for further DNA replication. The result is a large interlinked and replicating DNA concatamer. There is both positive induction and some negative feedback on transcription at each level by translational products of other temporal stages. Pathogenesis Little is known about the pathogenesis of iridoviruses.