Fundamental differences between the nucleic acid chaperone activities of HIV-1 nucleocapsid protein and Gag or Gag-derived proteins: Biological implications

• Published in: Virology (New York, N.Y.) Vol. 405; no. 2; pp. 556 - 567
• Main Authors: Wu, Tiyun, Datta, Siddhartha A.K, Mitra, Mithun, Gorelick, Robert J, Rein, Alan, Levin, Judith G
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier Inc 30.09.2010
• Subjects: Capsid protein; Cell Line; DNA, Viral - metabolism; Fluorescence Polarization; Gag; gag Gene Products, Human Immunodeficiency Virus - genetics; gag Gene Products, Human Immunodeficiency Virus - metabolism; HIV-1; HIV-1 - genetics; HIV-1 - metabolism; HIV-1 - physiology; Human immunodeficiency virus 1; Humans; Infectious Disease; Minus-strand transfer; Molecular Chaperones - genetics; Molecular Chaperones - metabolism; Nucleic acid chaperone; Nucleic Acid Conformation; Nucleic acid-driven multimerization; Nucleocapsid protein; Protein Multimerization; Retrovirus; Reverse Transcription; HIV-1; Retrovirus; Capsid protein; Minus-strand transfer; Nucleic acid chaperone; Reverse transcription; Gag; Nucleocapsid protein; Nucleic acid-driven multimerization
• ISSN: 0042-6822; 1096-0341; 1096-0341
• DOI: 10.1016/j.virol.2010.06.042

Abstract The HIV-1 Gag polyprotein precursor has multiple domains including nucleocapsid (NC). Although mature NC and NC embedded in Gag are nucleic acid chaperones (proteins that remodel nucleic acid structure), few studies include detailed analysis of the chaperone activity of partially processed Gag proteins and comparison with NC and Gag. Here we address this issue by using a reconstituted minus-strand transfer system. NC and NC-containing Gag proteins exhibited annealing and duplex destabilizing activities required for strand transfer. Surprisingly, unlike NC, with increasing concentrations, Gag proteins drastically inhibited the DNA elongation step. This result is consistent with “nucleic acid-driven multimerization” of Gag and the reported slow dissociation of Gag from bound nucleic acid, which prevent reverse transcriptase from traversing the template (“roadblock” mechanism). Our findings illustrate one reason why NC (and not Gag) has evolved as a critical cofactor in reverse transcription, a paradigm that might also extend to other retrovirus systems.