Hepatitis B viral polymerase fusion proteins are biologically active and can interact with the hepatitis C virus core protein in vivo

Journal of Biomedical Science - Tập 8 - Trang 492-503 - 2001
Kun-Lin Chen1, Chun-Ming Chen2, Chwen-Ming Shih2, Huey-Lan Huang1, Yan-Hwa Wu Lee2, Chungming Chang1,3, Szecheng J. Lo1
1Institute of Microbiology and Immunology, National Yang-Ming University, Taipei, Taiwan 112 (ROC)
2Institute of Biochemistry, National Yang-Ming University, Taiwan, ROC
3Division of Molecular and Genomic Medicine Research, National Health Research Institute, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC

Tóm tắt

Hepadnaviruses and retroviruses are evolutionarily related families because they both require a process of reverse transcription for genome replication. However, hepadnaviruses produce polymerase (pol) and core proteins separately, while retroviruses synthesize a gag-pol fusion protein that is subsequently cleaved by a virally encoded protease to release a functional polymerase. To test whether an additional sequence at the N-terminus of pol in hepatitis B virus (HBV) interferes with its function, we created two plasmids expressing core-pol fusion proteins, core144-pol and core31-pol. Secreted particles obtained from HuH-7 cells, which were cotransfected with a core-pol fusion protein-expressing plasmid and a core-expressing plasmid, showed a positive signal of HBV DNA by the endogenous polymerase assay, indicating that the core-pol fusion proteins retain DNA priming, polymerization and RNase H activities. The fusion protein was detected in the cytoplasm of transfected cells and in secreted virions by immunoprecipitation. Furthermore, we found by immunofluorescence staining that the HBV core-pol fusion protein colocalized with the hepatitis C virus (HCV) core protein in cytoplasm and in lipid droplets. Immunoprecipitation studies showed that the anti-HCV core complex contained the HBV core-pol fusion protein while the anti-HBV pol complex contained the HCV core protein, which supports the hypothesis that the HCV core protein can form a complex with the HBV core-pol fusion protein.

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