Human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 Gag domains have distinct RNA-binding specificities with implications for RNA packaging and dimerization
Abstract
Human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 (HTLV-1) is the first retrovirus that has conclusively been shown to cause human diseases. In HIV-1, specific interactions between the nucleocapsid (NC) domain of the Gag protein and genomic RNA (gRNA) mediate gRNA dimerization and selective packaging; however, the mechanism for gRNA packaging in HTLV-1, a deltaretrovirus, is unclear. In other deltaretroviruses, the matrix (MA) and NC domains of Gag are both involved in gRNA packaging, but MA binds nucleic acids with higher affinity and has more robust chaperone activity, suggesting that this domain may play a primary role. Here, we show that the MA domain of HTLV-1, but not the NC domain, binds short hairpin RNAs derived from the putative gRNA packaging signal. RNA probing of the HTLV-1 5' leader and cross-linking studies revealed that the primer-binding site and a region within the putative packaging signal form stable hairpins that interact with MA. In addition to a previously identified palindromic dimerization initiation site (DIS), we identified a new DIS in HTLV-1 gRNA and found that both palindromic sequences bind specifically the NC domain. Surprisingly, a mutant partially defective in dimer formation in vitro exhibited a significant ...Continue Reading
References
Oligonucleotide mapping of the core genomic RNA dimer linkage in human T-cell leukaemia virus type-1
Citations
Related Concepts
Related Feeds
ASBMB Publications
The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB) includes the Journal of Biological Chemistry, Molecular & Cellular Proteomics, and the Journal of Lipid Research. Discover the latest research from ASBMB here.