Search

Herpes simplex virus type I (HSV-1) infection causes inflammation in the cornea known as herpes simplex virus keratitis (HSK), a common but serious corneal disease. It is not entirely clear whether the virus during recurring infection comes from the trigeminal ganglia or the eye tissue, including the retina and ciliary ganglion. Because the tree shrew is closely related to primates and tree shrew eye anatomic structures are similar to humans, we studied HSV-1 corneal infection in the tree shrew. We found that HSK symptoms closely mimic those found in human HSK showing typical punctiform and dendritic viral keratitis during the acute infection period. Following the HSV-specific lesions, complications such as stromal scarring, corneal thickening (primary infection), opacity, and neovascularization were observed. In the tree shrew model, following ocular inoculation, the cornea becomes infected, and viral protein can be detected using anti-HSV-1 antibodies in the epithelial layer and retina neuronal ganglion cells. The HSV-1 transcripts, ICP0, ICP4, and LAT can be detected at 3 days post-infection (dpi), peaking at 5 dpi. After 2 weeks, ICP4 and ICP0 transcripts are reduced to a basal level, but the Latency Associated Transcripts (LATs) continue to accumulate. Interestingly, after the acute infection, we still detected abundant active HSV-1 in tree shrew eyes. Further, we found HSV-1 persistent in the ciliary ganglion and cornea. These findings are discussed in support of the tree shrew as a non-human primate HSK model, which could be useful for mechanistic studies of HSK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Blinding ocular herpetic disease in humans is due to herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) reactivations from latency, rather than to primary acute infection. The cellular and molecular immune mechanisms that control the HSV-1 latency-reactivation cycle remain to be fully elucidated. The aim of this study was to determine if reactivation of the HSV-1 latency-associated transcript (LAT) deletion mutant (dLAT2903) was impaired in this model, as it is in the rabbit model of induced and spontaneous reactivation and in the trigeminal ganglia (TG) explant-induced reactivation model in mice. The eyes of mice latently infected with wild-type HSV-1 strain McKrae (LAT virus) or dLAT2903 (LAT virus) were irradiated with UV-B, and reactivation was determined. We found that compared to LAT virus, LAT virus reactivated at a higher rate as determined by shedding of virus in tears on days 3 to 7 after UV-B treatment. Thus, the UV-B-induced reactivation mouse model of HSV-1 appears to be a useful small animal model for studying the mechanisms involved in how LAT enhances the HSV-1 reactivation phenotype. The utility of the model for investigating the immune evasion mechanisms regulating the HSV-1 latency/reactivation cycle and for testing the protective efficacy of candidate therapeutic vaccines and drugs is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Herpes simplex virus type 1 establishes a latent infection in the sensory neurons of the peripheral nervous system of humans. Although about 80 genes are expressed during the lytic cycle of the virus infection, essentially only one gene is expressed during the latent cycle. This gene is known as the latency-associated transcript (LAT), and it appears to play a role in the latency cycle through an anti-apoptotic function in the 5′ end of the gene and miRNA encoded along the length of the transcript which downregulate some of the viral immediate-early gene products. The LAT gene is about 8.3 kb long and consists of two exons separated by an unusual intron. The intron between the exons consists of two nested introns. This arrangement of introns has been called a twintron. Furthermore, the larger (2 kb) intron has been shown to be very stable. In this study, we measure the stability of the shorter 1.5-kb nested intron and find its half-life is similar to the longer intron. This was achieved by deleting the 0.5-kb overlapping intron from a plasmid construct designed to express the LAT transcript from a tet-inducible promoter and measuring the half-life of the 1.5-kb intron in tissue culture cells. This finding supports the hypothesis that it is the common branch-point region of these nested introns that is responsible for their stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During herpes simplex virus-1 (HSV-1) latency in sensory neurons, LAT (latency-associated transcript) is the only abundantly expressed viral gene. LAT plays an important role in the HSV-1 latency-reactivation cycle, because LAT deletion mutants have a significantly decreased reactivation phenotype. Based solely on sequence analysis, it was speculated that LAT encodes a ribozyme that plays an important role in how LAT enhances the virus' reactivation phenotype. Because LAT ribozyme activity has never been reported, we decided to test the converse hypothesis, namely, that this region of LAT does not encode a ribozyme function important for LAT's ability to enhance the reactivation phenotype. We constructed a viral mutant (LAT-Rz) in which the speculated ribozyme consensus sequence was altered such that no ribozyme was encoded. We report here that LAT-Rz had a wild-type reactivation phenotype in mice, confirming the hypothesis that the speculated LAT ribozyme is not a dominant factor in stimulating the latency-reactivation cycle in mice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Latency-associated transcript (LAT) deletion mutants of herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) have reduced reactivation phenotypes. Thus, LAT plays an essential role in the latency-reactivation cycle of HSV-1. We have shown that LAT has antiapoptosis activity and demonstrated that the chimeric virus, dLAT-cpIAP, resulting from replacing LAT with the baculovirus antiapoptosis gene cpIAP, has a wild-type HSV-1 reactivation phenotype in mice and rabbits. Thus, LAT can be replaced by an alternative antiapoptosis gene, confirming that LAT's antiapoptosis activity plays an important role in the mechanism by which LAT enhances the virus' reactivation phenotype. However, because cpIAP interferes with both of the major apoptosis pathways, these studies did not address whether LAT's proreactivation phenotype function was due to blocking the extrinsic (Fas-ligand-, caspase-8-, or caspase-10-dependent pathway) or the intrinsic (mitochondria-, caspase-9-dependent pathway) pathway, or whether both pathways must be blocked. Here we constructed an HSV-1 LAT(-) mutant that expresses cellular FLIP (cellular FLICE-like inhibitory protein) under control of the LAT promoter and in place of LAT nucleotides 76 to 1667. Mice were ocularly infected with this mutant, designated dLAT-FLIP, and the reactivation phenotype was determined using the trigeminal ganglia explant model. dLAT-FLIP had a reactivation phenotype similar to wild-type virus and significantly higher than the LAT(-) mutant dLAT2903. Thus, the LAT function responsible for enhancing the reactivation phenotype could be replaced with an antiapoptosis gene that primarily blocks the extrinsic signaling apoptosis pathway. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) primarily infects mucoepithelial tissues of the eye, the orofacial region, and to a lesser extent the genitalia. The virus is retrogradely transported through the axons of sensory and sympathetic neurons to their cell bodies to establishe a life-long latent infection. Throughout this latency period, the viral genome is transcriptionally silent except for a single region encoding the latency-associated transcript (LAT). The function of LAT is still largely unknown. To understand how HSV-1 latency might affect neurons, the authors transfected primary cultures of sympathetic neurons and trigeminal sensory neurons obtained from rat embryos with LAT-expressing plasmids. LAT increased the survival of both sympathetic and trigeminal neurons after induction of cell death by nerve growth factor (NGF) deprivation. Because HSV-1 is transported through axons both after initial infection and during reactivation, the authors considered the possibility that LAT may affect axonal growth. They found that LAT expression increased axonal regeneration by twofold in both types of neurons. Inhibition of the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway reverses stimulation of both neuronal survival and axonal regeneration, which indicates that these effects are mediated through the MAPK pathway. These data provide evidence that HSV-1 LAT promotes survival of sympathetic as well as trigeminal neurons. The authors show for the first time that LAT stimulates axonal regeneration in both sympathetic and trigeminal neurons. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mechanisms involved in the herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) latency-reactivation cycle are not fully understood. The latency-associated transcript (LAT) is the only HSV-1 RNA abundantly detected during neuronal latency. LAT plays a significant role in latency because LAT(-) mutants have a reduced reactivation phenotype. Several novel viral transcripts have been identified within the LAT locus, including UOL, which is located just upstream of LAT. The authors report here on a mutant, ?UOL, which has a 437-nucleotide deletion that deletes most of UOL. ?UOL replicated similarly to its wild-type parental McKrae HSV-1 strain in infected cells, the eyes, trigeminal ganglia, and brains of mice and rabbits. It was indistinguishable from wild-type virus as regards explant-induced reactivation in mice, and spontaneous reactivation in rabbits. In contrast, ?UOL was significantly less virulent in mice. Thus, UOL appears to be dispensable for the wild-type reactivation phenotype while appearing to play a role in neurovirulence in ocularly infected animals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]