Programmed ribosomal frameshift alters expression of west nile virus genes and facilitates virus replication in birds and mosquitoes.

ABSTRACT: West Nile virus (WNV) is a human pathogen of significant medical importance with close to 40,000 cases of encephalitis and more than 1,600 deaths reported in the US alone since its first emergence in New York in 1999. Previous studies identified a motif in the beginning of non-structural gene NS2A of encephalitic flaviviruses including WNV which induces programmed -1 ribosomal frameshift (PRF) resulting in production of an additional NS protein NS1'. We have previously demonstrated that mutant WNV with abolished PRF was attenuated in mice. Here we have extended our previous observations by showing that PRF does not appear to have a significant role in virus replication, virion formation, and viral spread in several cell lines in vitro. However, we have also shown that PRF induces an over p

SUBMITTER: Melian EB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4223154 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature