scholarly journals p53 Controls Murine Gammaherpesvirus Latency and Prevents Infection-Associated IgH/c-Myc Translocations

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shana M. Owens ◽  
Jeffrey M. Sifford ◽  
Gang Li ◽  
Eduardo Salinas ◽  
Debopam Ghosh ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTGammaherpesviruses (GHVs) establish life-long infections and cause cancer in humans and other animals. To facilitate chronic infection, GHV oncoproteins promote cellular proliferation and differentiation. Aberrant cell-cycle progression driven by viral oncogenes should trigger activation of tumor suppressor p53, unless p53 is functionally deactivated during GHV latency establishment. However, interactions of GHVs with the p53 pathway during the establishment and maintenance of latent infection are poorly defined. Here we demonstrate in vivo that p53 is induced specifically in infected cells during latency establishment by murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (MHV68). In the absence of p53, MHV68 latency establishment was significantly increased, especially in germinal center B cells, and correlated with enhanced cellular proliferation. However, enhanced latency was not sustainable, and MHV68 exhibited a defect in long-term latency maintenance in p53-deficient mice. Moreover, IgH/c-Myc translocations were readily detected in B cells from infected p53-null mice indicating virus-driven genomic instability. These data demonstrate that p53 intrinsically restricts MHV68 latency establishment and reveal a paradigm in which a host restriction factor provides a long-term benefit to a chronic pathogen by limiting infection-associated damage.

2003 ◽  
Vol 77 (15) ◽  
pp. 8310-8321 ◽  
Author(s):  
David O. Willer ◽  
Samuel H. Speck

ABSTRACT Murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (γHV68; also known as MHV-68) can establish a latent infection in both inbred and outbred strains of mice and, as such, provides a tractable small-animal model to address mechanisms and cell types involved in the establishment and maintenance of chronic gammaherpesvirus infection. Latency can be established at multiple anatomic sites, including the spleen and peritoneum; however, the contribution of distinct cell types to the maintenance of latency within these reservoirs remains poorly characterized. B cells are the major hematopoietic cell type harboring latent γHV68. We have analyzed various splenic B-cell subsets at early, intermediate, and late times postinfection and determined the frequency of cells either (i) capable of spontaneously reactivating latent γHV68 or (ii) harboring latent viral genome. These analyses demonstrated that latency is established in a variety of cell populations but that long-term latency (6 months postinfection) in the spleen after intranasal inoculation predominantly occurs in B cells. Furthermore, at late times postinfection latent γHV68 is largely confined to the surface immunoglobulin D-negative subset of B cells.


2010 ◽  
Vol 84 (17) ◽  
pp. 8975-8979
Author(s):  
Janet Weslow-Schmidt ◽  
Fang Ye ◽  
Stephanie S. Cush ◽  
Kathleen A. Stuller ◽  
Marcia A. Blackman ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT It is still unknown whether a noninfectious gammaherpesvirus vaccine is able to prevent or reduce virus persistence. This led us to use dendritic cells loaded with tumor B cells as a vaccine approach for the murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (γHV68) model of infection. Dendritic cells loaded with UV-irradiated latently infected tumor B cells induce broad, strong, and long-lasting immunity against γHV68. Dendritic cell vaccination prevents the enlargement of lymph nodes and severely limits acute infection and early latency but does not prevent γHV68 from establishing long-term latency. Our findings support the concept that attenuated viruses may be the best vaccine option for preventing gammaherpesvirus persistence.


2007 ◽  
Vol 81 (23) ◽  
pp. 13082-13091 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurent Gillet ◽  
Philip G. Stevenson

ABSTRACT Herpesviruses use multiple virion glycoproteins to enter cells. How these work together is not well understood: some may act separately or they may form a single complex. Murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (MHV-68) gB, gH, gL, and gp150 all participate in entry. gB and gL are involved in binding, gB and gH are conserved fusion proteins, and gp150 inhibits cell binding until glycosaminoglycans are engaged. Here we show that a gH-specific antibody coprecipitates gB and thus that gH and gB are associated in the virion membrane. A gH/gL-specific antibody also coprecipitated gB, implying a tripartite complex of gL/gH/gB, although the gH/gB association did not require gL. The association was also independent of gp150, and gp150 was not demonstrably bound to gB or gH. However, gp150 incorporation into virions was partly gL dependent, suggesting that it too contributes to a single entry complex. gp150− and gL− gp150− mutants bound better than the wild type to B cells and readily colonized B cells in vivo. Thus, gp150 and gL appear to be epithelial cell-adapted accessories of a core gB/gH entry complex. The cell binding revealed by gp150 disruption did not require gL and therefore seemed most likely to involve gB.


2005 ◽  
Vol 86 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brigitte D. de Lima ◽  
Janet S. May ◽  
Sofia Marques ◽  
J. Pedro Simas ◽  
Philip G. Stevenson

The gammaherpesviruses are characteristically latent in lymphocytes and exploit lymphocyte proliferation to establish a large, persistent pool of latent genomes. Murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (MHV-68) allows the in vivo analysis of viral genes that contribute to this and other aspects of host colonization. In this study, the MHV-68 bcl-2 homologue, M11, was disrupted either in its BH1 homology domain or upstream of its membrane-localizing C-terminal domain. Each M11 mutant showed normal lytic replication in vitro and in vivo, but had a reduction in peak splenic latency. Lower infectious-centre titres correlated with lower in vivo B-cell activation, lower viral genome loads and reduced viral tRNA expression. This was therefore a true latency deficit, rather than a deficit in ex vivo reactivation. Stable, long-term levels of splenic latency were normal. M11 function therefore contributed specifically to viral latency amplification in infected lymphoid tissue.


mBio ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandeep Steven Reddy ◽  
Hui-Chen Chang Foreman ◽  
Thubten Ozula Sioux ◽  
Gee Ho Park ◽  
Valeria Poli ◽  
...  

ABSTRACTA challenging property of gammaherpesviruses is their ability to establish lifelong persistence. The establishment of latency in B cells is thought to involve active virus engagement of host signaling pathways. Pathogenic effects of these viruses during latency or following reactivation can be devastating to the host. Many cancers, including those associated with members of the gammaherpesvirus family, Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpesvirus and Epstein-Barr virus, express elevated levels of active host signal transducer and activator of transcription-3 (STAT3). STAT3 is activated by tyrosine phosphorylation in response to many cytokines and can orchestrate effector responses that include proliferation, inflammation, metastasis, and developmental programming. However, the contribution of STAT3 to gammaherpesvirus pathogenesis remains to be completely understood. This is the first study to have identified STAT3 as a critical host determinant of the ability of gammaherpesvirus to establish long-term latency in an animal model of disease. Following an acute infection, murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (MHV68) established latency in resident B cells, but establishment of latency was dramatically reduced in animals with a B cell-specific STAT3 deletion. The lack of STAT3 in B cells did not impair germinal center responses for immunoglobulin (Ig) class switching in the spleen and did not reduce either total or virus-specific IgG titers. Although ablation of STAT3 in B cells did not have a global effect on these assays of B cell function, it had long-term consequences for the viral load of the host, since virus latency was reduced at 6 to 8 weeks postinfection. Our findings establish host STAT3 as a mediator of gammaherpesvirus persistence.IMPORTANCEThe insidious ability of gammaherpesviruses to establish latent infections can have detrimental consequences for the host. Identification of host factors that promote viral latency is essential for understanding latency mechanisms and for therapeutic interventions. We provide the first evidence that STAT3 expression is needed for murine gammaherpesvirus 68 to establish latency in primary B cells during an active immune response to infection. STAT3 deletion in B cells does not impair adaptive immune control of the virus, but loss of STAT3 in B cells has a long-lasting impact on viral persistence. These results indicate a potential therapeutic benefit of STAT3 inhibitors for combating gammaherpesvirus latency and, thereby, associated pathologies.


2004 ◽  
Vol 78 (2) ◽  
pp. 758-767 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. C. Townsley ◽  
B. M. Dutia ◽  
A. A. Nash

ABSTRACT Murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (MHV-68) infection of mice represents a viable small-animal model for the study of gammaherpesvirus pathogenesis. MHV-76 is a deletion mutant of MHV-68, which lacks four MHV-68-specific genes (M1 to M4) and eight viral tRNA-like sequences at the 5′ end of the genome. These genes are implicated in latency and/or immune evasion. Consequently, MHV-76 is attenuated in the acute phase of in vivo infection with respect to MHV-68. Little is known about the role of M4 in viral infection, except that it is expressed as an immediate-early/early transcript during lytic replication of MHV-68 in vitro. To elucidate the contribution M4 makes to in vivo pathogenesis, we created a novel MHV-76 mutant (MHV-76inM4), in which the region of MHV-68 coding for M4 and accompanying putative promoter elements were inserted into the 5′ region of the MHV-76 genome. The growth of MHV-76inM4 in vitro was indistinguishable from that of MHV-76 and MHV-68. However, virus titers from MHV-76inM4-infected BALB/c mice were significantly increased with respect to MHV-76 at early times in the lung. In addition, at days 17 and 21 postinfection, there was a significant elevation in latent viral load in splenocytes of MHV-76inM4-infected mice compared to MHV-76. Like MHV-76-infected mice, MHV-76inM4-infected mice display no evidence of overt splenomegaly, a finding characteristic of MHV-68 infection. M4 expression in vivo was detectable during productive infection in the lung and during the establishment of latency in the spleen, but in general M4 was not detectable during long-term latency (day 100 postinfection).


2008 ◽  
Vol 82 (16) ◽  
pp. 8000-8012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul D. Ling ◽  
Jie Tan ◽  
Jaturong Sewatanon ◽  
RongSheng Peng

ABSTRACT Promyelocytic Leukemia nuclear body (PML NB) proteins mediate an intrinsic cellular host defense response against virus infections. Herpesviruses express proteins that modulate PML or PML-associated proteins by a variety of strategies, including degradation of PML or relocalization of PML NB proteins. The consequences of PML-herpesvirus interactions during infection in vivo have yet to be investigated in detail, largely because of the species-specific tropism of many human herpesviruses. Murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (γHV68) is emerging as a suitable model to study basic biological questions of virus-host interactions because it naturally infects mice. Therefore, we sought to determine whether γHV68 targets PML NBs as part of its natural life cycle. We found that γHV68 induces PML degradation through a proteasome-dependent mechanism and that loss of PML results in more robust virus replication in mouse fibroblasts. Surprisingly, γHV68-mediated PML degradation was mediated by the virion tegument protein ORF75c, which shares homology with the cellular formylglycinamide ribotide amidotransferase enzyme. In addition, we show that ORF75c is essential for production of infectious virus. ORF75 homologs are conserved in all rhadinoviruses but so far have no assigned functions. Our studies shed light on a potential role for this unusual protein in rhadinovirus biology and suggest that γHV68 will be a useful model for investigation of PML-herpesvirus interactions in vivo.


2002 ◽  
Vol 76 (13) ◽  
pp. 6532-6544 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric T. Clambey ◽  
Herbert W. Virgin ◽  
Samuel H. Speck

ABSTRACT Murine gammaherpesvirus 68 (γHV68 [also known as MHV-68]) establishes a latent infection in mice, providing a small-animal model with which to identify host and viral factors that regulate gammaherpesvirus latency. While γHV68 establishes a latent infection in multiple tissues, including splenocytes and peritoneal cells, the requirements for latent infection within these tissues are poorly defined. Here we report the characterization of a spontaneous 9.5-kb-deletion mutant of γHV68 that lacks the M1, M2, M3, and M4 genes and eight viral tRNA-like genes. Previously, this locus has been shown to contain the latency-associated M2, M3, and viral tRNA-like genes. Through characterization of this mutant, we found that the M1, M2, M3, M4 genes and the viral tRNA-like genes are dispensable for (i) in vitro replication and (ii) the establishment and maintenance of latency in vivo and reactivation from latency following intraperitoneal infection. In contrast, following intranasal infection with this mutant, there was a defect in splenic latency at both early and late times, a phenotype not observed in peritoneal cells. These results indicate (i) that there are different genetic requirements for the establishment of latency in different latent reservoirs and (ii) that the genetic requirements for latency depend on the route of infection. While some of these phenotypes have been observed with specific mutations in the M1 and M2 genes, other phenotypes have never been observed with the available γHV68 mutants. These studies highlight the importance of loss-of-function mutations in defining the genetic requirements for the establishment and maintenance of herpesvirus latency.


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