Review
Core protein: A pleiotropic keystone in the HBV lifecycle- Adam Zlotnicka, , ,
- Balasubramanian Venkatakrishnana,
- Zhenning Tanb, c,
- Eric Lewellynb, c,
- William Turnerb, c,
- Samson Francisa, b, c
- a Molecular & Cellular Biology, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, United States
- b Assembly BioSciences, Bloomington, IN, United States
- c Assembly BioSciences, San Francisco, CA, United States
Received 7 May 2015, Revised 22 June 2015, Accepted 26 June 2015, Available online 27 June 2015
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doi:10.1016/j.antiviral.2015.06.020Get rights and content
Highlights•HBV core protein (Cp) is a small, helical homodimer that has many functions vital to the viral lifecycle. •In the nucleus, Cp can affect the epigenetics of viral DNA. •In the cytoplasm, Cp assembles into 120-dimer capsids that are the sites of DNA synthesis. •Cp interacts with a range of host proteins including some that can attenuate the virus replication. •Cp is allosteric and thus susceptible to control by core protein allosteric modulators (CpAMs).
AbstractHepatitis B Virus (HBV) is a small virus whose genome has only four open reading frames. We argue that the simplicity of the virion correlates with a complexity of functions for viral proteins. We focus on the HBV core protein (Cp), a small (183 residue) protein that self-assembles to form the viral capsid. However, its functions are a little more complicated than that. In an infected cell Cp modulates almost every step of the viral lifecycle. Cp is bound to nuclear viral DNA and affects its epigenetics. Cp correlates with RNA specificity. Cp assembles specifically on a reverse transcriptase-viral RNA complex or, apparently, nothing at all. Indeed Cp has been one of the model systems for investigation of virus self-assembly. Cp participates in regulation of reverse transcription. Cp signals completion of reverse transcription to support virus secretion. Cp carries both nuclear localization signals and HBV surface antigen (HBsAg) binding sites; both of these functions appear to be regulated by contents of the capsid. Cp can be targeted by antivirals – while self-assembly is the most accessible of Cp activities, we argue that it makes sense to engage the broader spectrum of Cp function. This article forms part of a symposium in Antiviral Research on “From the discovery of the Australia antigen to the development of new curative therapies for hepatitis B: an unfinished story.”
Keywords- Hepatitis B Virus;
- Capsid;
- Self-assembly;
- Antiviral therapy
Corresponding author at: 212 S Hawthorne Dr., Si 220, Molecular and Cellular Biochemistry Department, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, United States.
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