The snakehead retrovirus promoter functions independently of the 3'ORF protein and its products are maternally inherited in transgenic zebrafish.

ABSTRACT: The exogenous snakehead retrovirus (SnRV) is an unclassified member of the Orthoretrovirinae subfamily, discovered in cell lines derived from several fish species. SnRV resembles complex lentiviruses and potentially encodes accessory proteins, including the product of the 3' open reading frame (3'ORF). The 3'ORF protein was suggested to function as a transactivator of transcription (Tat). Here, we constructed an infectious molecular clone for SnRV and tested the effects of 3'ORF mutations on SnRV transcription. Although replacing 3'ORF with foreign sequences strongly reduced virus expression and production, an out-of-frame point mutation in 3'ORF had only a minimal effect on SnRV replication. This latter result suggests that the 3'ORF protein does not function as Tat and that SnRV transcri

SUBMITTER: Zamostiano R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12193657 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature