Blocking premature reverse transcription fails to rescue the HIV-1 nucleocapsid-mutant replication defect.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The nucleocapsid (NC) protein of HIV-1 is critical for viral replication. Mutational analyses have demonstrated its involvement in viral assembly, genome packaging, budding, maturation, reverse transcription, and integration. We previously reported that two conservative NC mutations, His23Cys and His44Cys, cause premature reverse transcription such that mutant virions contain approximately 1,000-fold more DNA than wild-type virus, and are replication defective. In addition, both mutants show a specific defect in integration after infection.

Results

In the present study we investigated whether blocking premature reverse transcription would relieve the infectivity defects, which we successfully performed by transfecting proviral plasmids into cells cultured in the p

SUBMITTER: Thomas JA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3141651 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature