Virus Sindbis

Alphaviruses, such as Sindbis virus and Semliki Forest virus, are a group of mosquito-borne, enveloped RNA viruses that can cause encephalitis, fever, arthritis and rashes in mammals. These viruses have two protein shells—an outer glycoprotein layer and an inner core— which are separated by a lipid bilayer, a membrane. Studies by cryoelectron microscopy have shown that... 

Choi, H.-K., et al. Structure of Sindbis virus core protein reveals a chymotrypsin-like serine proteinase and the organization of the virion. Nature 354 37-43, 1991. 

An additional virus that has more recently gained some attention as a possible vector is that of the sindbis virus. A member of the alphavirus family, this ssRNA virus can infect a broad range of both insect and vertebrate cells. The mature virion particles consist of the RNA genome com-plexed with a capsid protein C. This, in turn, is enveloped by a lipid bilayer in which two additional viral proteins (El and E2) are embedded. The E2 polypeptide appears to mediate viral binding to the surface receptors of susceptible cells. The major mammalian cell surface receptor it targets appears to be the highly conserved, widely distributed laminin receptor. 

The sindbis virus is simple, robust, capable of infecting non-dividing cells and generally supports high levels of gene expression. However, it does display a broad host range and, hence, lacks the inherent targeting specificity characteristic of an idealized viral vector. 

One experimental tool in this direction is provided by some enveloped animal viruses which mature at the cell surface of infected cells (K Sri inen and Renkonen, 1977 Lenard, 1978). Such viruses include influenza virus, Semliki Forest virus (SFV), Sindbis virus, and vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV). They are extremely simple in makeup and hence are very well characterized. They can be tagged with biochemical probes in many different ways. They infect many animal cells in culture, and after infection turn the cells into factories for the production of virus progeny. The protein-synthesizing machinery of the host cell is programmed by the viral RNA to make viral proteins exclusively and these include the viral surface glycoproteins. These are synthesized with signal peptides and inserted into the ER membrane (Katz et ai, 1977 Garoff et... 

Fig. 1. Nucleotide sequence of the SFV 26 S RNA (top row), the corresponding amino acid sequence (middle row), and the amino acid sequence of the Sindbis virus structural proteins (bottom row). Nucleotides are numbered from the 5 end of the RNA molecule and all amino adds from the amino terminus of each protein. The amino- and the carboxyl-terminal ends of each protein are indicated hy arrows, glycosylation sites by triangles, and membrane-spanning regions of the viral glycoproteins by underlines for Sindbis virus and overlines for SFV. Amino acids in boxes are negatively charged (Asp and Glu), and those circled are positively charged (Lys and Arg). Some restriction endonuclease cleavage sites are shown on the nucleotide sequence. The alignment of the amino acid...

The E3 chain is composed of 66 amino acid residues in SFV, and 64 in Sindbis virus. The 2 protein is 422 amino acids in length in SFV and... 

Further confirmation for the location of the membrane-spanning domains of the El and of the E2 polypeptide chains has come from studies of Sindbis virus. After chymotrypsin digestion of the viral particle, the... 

The membrane fusion activity is probably a function of the El protein, since the hemolytic activity of Sindbis virus can be inhibited by monoclonal antibodies specific for El (Chanas et al., 1982). Moreover, studies using cDNA molecules coding for the spike proteins have shown that if the spike protein is expressed at the cell surface, fusion between cells is induced at low pH. However, when the p62 protein is expressed alone, no fusion occurs (Kondor-Koch et al., 1983). 

Hernandez, R., Nelson, S., Salm, J. R., Brown, D. T., and Alpert, A. J., Rapid preparative purification of West Nile and Sindbis virus PCR products utilizing a microbore anion-exchange column. Journal of Virological Methods 120(2), 141-149, 2004. 

The diminution in infectivity could be caused either by the production of virus particles having a lessened or abolished infectivity, or a decreased formation of infectious virions. The envelope glycoproteins of Semliki Forest virus and Sindbis virus synthesized in the presence of tunicamycin (and, thus, devoid of carbohydrate) are metabolically stable. They do not participate in the assembly of virus particles, although nucleocapsids are still formed under these conditions and are... 

Some E. coli bacteriophages, including f2, MS2, R17, and Qj8, as well as some eukaryotic viruses (including influenza and Sindbis viruses, the latter associated with a form of encephalitis) have RNA genomes. The single-stranded RNA chromosomes of these viruses, which also function as mRNAs for the synthesis of viral proteins, are replicated in the host cell by an RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RNA replicase). All RNA viruses—with the exception of retroviruses—must encode a protein with RNA-dependent RNA polymerase activity because the host cells do not possess this enzyme. 

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