Latency, chromatin remodeling, and reactivation of human cytomegalovirus in the dendritic cells of healthy carriers.

ABSTRACT: Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) persists as a subclinical, lifelong infection in the normal human host, but reactivation from latency in immunocompromised subjects results in serious disease. Latency and reactivation are defining characteristics of the herpesviruses and are key to understanding their biology; however, the precise cellular sites in which HCMV is carried and the mechanisms regulating its latency and reactivation during natural infection remain poorly understood. Here we present evidence, based entirely on direct analysis of material isolated from healthy virus carriers, to show that myeloid dendritic cell (DC) progenitors are sites of HCMV latency and that their ex vivo differentiation to a mature DC phenotype is linked with reactivation of infectious virus resulting from diffe

SUBMITTER: Reeves MB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC554799 | biostudies-literature | 2005 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature