Protein turnover and inclusion body formation

In a recent study, we investigated the relationship between inclusion body (IB) formation and the activity of the ubiquitin-

proteasome system (UPS) in a primary neuron model of Huntington disease. We followed individual neurons over the

course of days and monitored the level of mutant huntingtin (htt) (which causes Huntington disease), IB formation, UPS function,

and neuronal toxicity. The accumulation of UPS substrates and neuronal toxicity increased with increasing levels of proteasome

inhibition. The UPS was more impaired in neurons that subsequently formed IBs than in those that did not; however, after IBs

formed, UPS function improved. These findings suggest that IB formation is a protective cellular response mediated in part by

increased degradation of intracellular protein.     

Role of molecular chaperones in inclusion body formation

Protein misfolding and aggregation are linked to several degenerative diseases and are responsible for the formation of bacterial inclusion bodies. Roles of molecular chaperones in promoting protein deposition have been speculated but not proven in vivo. We have investigated the involvement of individual chaperones in inclusion body formation by producing the misfolding-prone but partially soluble VP1LAC protein in chaperone null bacterial strains. Unexpectedly, the absence of a functional GroEL significantly reduced aggregation and favoured the incidence of the soluble protein form, from 4 to 35% of the total VP1LAC protein. On the other hand, no regular inclusion bodies were then formed but more abundant small aggregates up to 0.05 microm(3). Contrarily, in a DnaK(-) background, the amount of inclusion body protein was 2.5-fold higher than in the wild-type strain and the average volume of the inclusion bodies increased from 0.25 to 0.38 microm(3). Also in the absence of DnaK, the minor fraction of soluble protein appears as highly proteolytically stable, suggesting an inverse connection between proteolysis and aggregation managed by this chaperone. In summary, GroEL and DnaK appear as major antagonist controllers of inclusion body formation by promoting and preventing, respectively, the aggregation of misfolded polypeptides. GroEL might have, in addition, a key role in driving the protein transit from the soluble to the insoluble cell fraction and also in the opposite direction. Although chaperones ClpB, ClpA, IbpA and IbpB also participate in these processes, the impact of the respective null mutations on bacterial inclusion body formation is much more moderate.     

人巨细胞病毒病毒体的组装研究新进展

阐明人巨细胞病毒（HCMV）病毒体的组装过程对研究HCMV致病分子机制有重要意义,同时可为抗病毒药物的设计与运用提供新的思路。HCMV组装可概括为两大阶段：初期为入核阶段,主要为核衣壳的组装。在胞质中表达的病毒蛋白形成多种形式的多聚体进入细胞核,在核内相互作用形成衣壳并将病毒DNA装入衣壳中,核衣壳初步形成。第二阶段为出核阶段,主要涉及被膜与包膜的组装。在核中形成的原始核衣壳出核移至胞质,最终在胞质中组装完成,此过程极其复杂,涉及众多蛋白间相互作用及宿主细胞的参与。值得一提的是,组装过程中多种蛋白的变异会导致病毒复制失败。组装完成的病毒体经修饰成熟释放出细胞后,再感染新的宿主细胞。本文对HCMV病毒体组装机制的最新研究作一综述。     

Vector-mediated overexpression of catalase A in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae induces inclusion body formation.

To study the morphological effects of overexpression of catalase A in yeast, the gene coding for catalase A was introduced into Saccharomyces cerevisiae on a multicopy vector. After induction of microbody biogenesis and catalase A expression by growth on oleic acid as sole carbon source, cells were analyzed by immunofluorescence and immunoelectron microscopy. In addition, overexpression of catalase A was studied by quantitative immunoblotting and by activity measurement. Quantitative immunoblotting resulted in a 16-fold difference between immunoreactive material from transformed and non-transformed cells. An 18-fold increase of enzyme activity was measured in transformed cells due to overexpression of catalase A from plasmid pAH521. Immunofluorescent staining of semithin sections of Lowicryl HM20-embedded cells with anti-catalase localized peroxisomes and--at a low percentage--larger particles. By immunoelectron microscopy, these larger structures could be identified as agranular, electron-dense aggregates which are morphologically clearly distinct from the cytoplasm and not bounded by a membrane. These structures, which have been named inclusion bodies, contain catalase A but not other peroxisomal enzymes like thiolase. These findings suggest that cells are capable of compensating for overproduced proteins by formation of particular types of structures.     

Temperature effect on inclusion body formation and stress response in the periplasm of Escherichia coli

We previously characterized a defective-folding mutant of maltose-binding protein of Escherichia coli, MalE31, which formed periplasmic inclusion bodies. Here, we show that MalE31 aggregation does not affect bacterial growth at 30 degrees C but is lethal at 37 degrees C. Surprisingly, under mild heat shock conditions at 42 degrees C, inclusion bodies are degraded and bacterial growth is restored. One physiological consequence for the cells overproducing MalE31 was to induce an extracytoplasmic stress response by increasing the expression of the heat shock protease DegP via the CpxA/CpxR two-component signalling pathway. Furthermore, we show that the Cpx response is required to rescue the cells from the toxicity mediated by MalE31. Finally, expression of highly destabilized MalE variants that do not aggregate in the periplasm also induces the Cpx pathway, indicating that inclusion body formation is not necessary to activate this specific extracytoplasmic stress regulatory system.     

Human cytomegalovirus: host immune modulation by the viral US3 gene

Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) is a common infection, opportunistically causing disease in people with immune system deficits. HCMV expresses several proteins that contribute to avoidance of the host immune response. The US3 gene is one of the first immune evasion genes expressed following infection. Expression of the US3 gene is highly regulated, with the gene encoding autoregulatory proteins. The largest of the US3 proteins, a 22 kDa resident endoplasmic reticulum protein, binds to MHC class I heavy chain complexes and components of the peptide loading complex, delaying the maturation of the MHC class I complexes and presentation of viral antigen on the surface of infected cells. A smaller US3 protein, a 17 kDa US3 protein, competes with the 22 kDa for protein interactions, counteracting, in part, the effects of the larger protein. The US3 amino acid sequence is highly conserved among clinical isolates and laboratory strains, suggesting an important role for this gene in natural infections in the human host.     

磷酸化病毒蛋白的生物学功能及形成机制

磷酸化是病毒蛋白常见的一种翻译后修饰,在调控病毒与宿主的代谢中起重要作用。生物体内的代谢活动与细胞内的信号转导密切相关,通过磷酸化和去磷酸化修饰可改变蛋白生物活性,从而调控胞内生物信号的传递。磷酸化修饰的病毒蛋白参与调控病毒复制、病毒增殖和病毒粒子装配等一系列病毒的代谢活动,同时也影响宿主细胞内的信号转导,抑制宿主基因组复制和表达。本文就病毒蛋白的磷酸化修饰位点、其生物学功能及磷酸化修饰的分子机制进行综述,为病毒感染性疾病的防控治疗及药物开发提供参考。     

Factors influencing inclusion body formation in the production of a fused protein in Escherichia coli.

Different parameters that influenced the formation of inclusion bodies in Escherichia coli during production of a fused protein consisting of protein A from Staphylococcus aureus and beta-galactosidase from E. coli were examined. The intracellular expression of the fused protein was controlled by the pR promoter and its temperature-sensitive repressor. The induction temperature, the pH of the cultivation medium, and changes in the amino acid sequence in the linker region between protein A and beta-galactosidase had a profound effect on the formation of inclusion bodies. At 42 degrees C, inclusion bodies were formed only during the first hours after induction, and thereafter all the recombinant protein that was further produced appeared in a soluble and active state. Production at 39 and 44 degrees C resulted in inclusion body formation throughout the production period with 15 to 20% of the produced recombinant protein appearing as inclusion bodies. Cultivating cells without control of pH caused inclusion body formation throughout the induction period, and inclusion body formation increased with decreasing pH, and at least part of the insoluble protein was formed from the pool of soluble fusion protein within the cell. Changes in the amino acid sequence in the linker region between the two parts of the fusion protein abolished inclusion body formation.     

Dark proteins: effect of inclusion body formation on quantification of protein expression

Plasmid-borne gene expression systems have found wide application in the emerging fields of systems biology and synthetic biology, where plasmids are used to implement simple network architectures, either to test systems biology hypotheses about issues such as gene expression noise or as a means of exerting artificial control over a cell's dynamics. In both these cases, fluorescent proteins are commonly applied as a means of monitoring the expression of genes in the living cell, and efforts have been made to quantify protein expression levels through fluorescence intensity calibration and by monitoring the partitioning of proteins among the two daughter cells after division; such quantification is important in formulating the predictive models desired in systems and synthetic biology research. A potential pitfall of using plasmid-based gene expression systems is that the high protein levels associated with expression from plasmids can lead to the formation of inclusion bodies, insoluble aggregates of misfolded, nonfunctional proteins that will not generate fluorescence output; proteins caught in these inclusion bodies are thus "dark" to fluorescence-based detection methods. If significant numbers of proteins are incorporated into inclusion bodies rather than becoming biologically active, quantitative results obtained by fluorescent measurements will be skewed; we investigate this phenomenon here. We have created two plasmid constructs with differing average copy numbers, both incorporating an unregulated promoter (P(LtetO-1) in the absence of TetR) expressing the GFP derivative enhanced green fluorescent protein (EGFP), and inserted them into Escherichia coli bacterial cells (a common model organism for work on the dynamics of prokaryotic gene expression). We extracted the inclusion bodies, denatured them, and refolded them to render them active, obtaining a measurement of the average number of EGFP per cell locked into these aggregates; at the same time, we used calibrated fluorescent intensity measurements to determine the average number of active EGFP present per cell. Both measurements were carried out as a function of cellular doubling time, over a range of 45-75 min. We found that the ratio of inclusion body EGFP to active EGFP varied strongly as a function of the cellular growth rate, and that the number of "dark" proteins in the aggregates could in fact be substantial, reaching ratios as high as approximately five proteins locked into inclusion bodies for every active protein (at the fastest growth rate), and dropping to ratios well below 1 (for the slowest growth rate). Our results suggest that efforts to compare computational models to protein numbers derived from fluorescence measurements should take inclusion body loss into account, especially when working with rapidly growing cells.     

Human cytomegalovirus virions differentially incorporate viral and host cell RNA during the assembly process

While analyzing human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) gene expression in infected cells by RNA-specific nucleic acid sequence-based amplification (NASBA), positive results were observed for HCMV RNA encoded by several viral genes immediately after the addition of the virus. UV-inactivated virus also gave a positive NASBA result without establishing active infection, suggesting that RNA was associated with the inoculum. Highly purified virions devoid of cellular contamination proved to be positive for viral RNA encoding both immediate-early (UL123) and late (UL65) gene products. Virion-associated RNA might be incorporated specifically or without selection during the virion assembly. In the latter case, cellular RNA would also be present in the virion. A high-abundant cellular RNA encoded by GAPDH and even U1A RNA, which is expressed at low levels, were detected in the virion fraction, whereas cellular DNA was absent. Virion fractionation revealed that cellular RNA was absent in purified de-enveloped capsids. In conclusion, cellular and viral RNA was present between the capsid and envelope of the virion, whereas in the capsid only viral RNA could be detected. The results suggest that virion-associated viral and cellular RNA is incorporated nonspecifically during virion assembly.     

A second cauliflower mosaic virus gene product influences the structure of the viral inclusion body

We have used electron microscopy of thin sections and experiments on isolated viroplasms to compare the properties of four strains of cauliflower mosaic virus (CaMV), three of which were partially or completely deleted in open reading frame (ORF) II. Our results confirm that this gene is required for aphid transmissibility and show that the product of ORF II influences the firmness with which virions are held within the viroplasm. Analysis of the proteins in the viroplasms showed that a mutant with a partial deletion in ORF II produced a protein smaller than the normal ORF product. This smaller protein was non-functional with respect both to aphid transmissibility and properties of the viroplasms.     

The kinetics of RCC1 inclusion body formation in Escherichia Coli

The Regulator of Chromosome Condensation protein (RCC1) is located in both the soluble and inclusion body (IB) fractions of the whole cell lysate when expressed in Escherichia coli BL21 (pLysS) at temperatures below 30 degrees C. When bacterial growth was carried out at 20 degrees C, the majority of the RCC1 remained soluble up to 5.5 h postinduction, When the temperature was raised to 25 degrees C, RCC1 IB was dominant by 1.5 h postinduction. The shift in RCC1 IB formation with temperature suggests that in addition to increased translation rates, folding and aggregation processes may contribute to RCC1 IB formation at higher temperatures. (c) 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Human cytomegalovirus. IV. Specific inhibition of virus-induced DNA polymerase activity and viral DNA replication by phosphonoacetic acid.

Phosphonoacetic acid specifically inhibited human cytomegalovirus DNA synthesis in virus-infected human fibroblasts as detected by virus-specific nucleic acid hybridization. Inhibition was reversible; viral DNA synthesis resumed upon the removal of the drug. The compound partially inhibited DNA synthesis of host cells in the log phase of growth but had little effect on confluent cells. Studies of partially purified enzymes indicated that phosphonoacetic acid specifically inhibited virus-induced DNA polymerase and had only a slight effect on normal host cell enzymes. The drug was shown to interact directly with virus-induced enzyme but not with the template-primers.     

Human cytomegalovirus UL84 insertion mutant defective for viral DNA synthesis and growth

Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) UL84 is required for oriLyt-dependent DNA replication, and evidence from transient transfection assays suggests that UL84 directly participates in DNA synthesis. In addition, because of its apparent interaction with IE2, UL84 is implicated as a possible regulatory protein. To address the role of UL84 in the context of the viral genome, we generated a recombinant HCMV bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) construct that did not express the UL84 gene product. This construct, BAC-IN84/Ep, displayed a null phenotype in that it failed to produce infectious virus after transfection into human fibroblast cells, whereas a revertant virus readily produced viral plaques and, subsequently, infectious virus. Real-time quantitative PCR showed that BAC-IN84/Ep was defective for DNA synthesis in that no increase in the accumulation of viral DNA was observed in transfected cells. We were unable to complement BAC-IN84/Ep in trans; however, oriLyt-dependent DNA replication was observed by the cotransfection of UL84 and BAC-IN84/Ep. An analysis of viral mRNA by real-time PCR indicated that, even in the absence of DNA synthesis, all representative kinetic classes of genes were expressed in cells transfected with BAC-IN84/Ep. The detection of UL44 and IE2 by immunofluorescence in BAC-IN84/Ep-transfected cells showed that these proteins failed to partition into replication compartments, indicating that UL84 expression is essential for the formation of these proteins into replication centers within the context of the viral genome. These results show that UL84 provides an essential DNA replication function and influences the subcellular localization of other viral proteins.