Cloning, expression and antiviral activity of mink alpha-interferons.

ABSTRACT:

Background

As a key link between innate and adaptive immune responses, the interferon (IFN) system is the first line of defense against viral infection. IFN, and in particular, IFN-α, has been used clinically as an effective therapeutic agent for viral infections. However, different subtypes of IFN-α demonstrate distinct antiviral activity. Therefore, it is important to identify IFN-α subtypes with high antiviral activity for the development of genetically engineered antiviral drugs.

Results

In this study, we cloned the genes for 13 IFN-α subtypes from peripheral blood lymphocytes of the mink. The homologies of the 13 mink IFN-α genes were 93.6-99.3% and 88.8-98.4% at the nucleotide and amino acid sequence levels, respectively. In contrast to human and canine IFN-α subtypes,

SUBMITTER: Zhang HL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4353462 | biostudies-literature | 2015 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature