HHV Latency Associated Transcript - LAT Regulates The Expression of Lytic Genes

LAT Regulates The Expression of Lytic Genes

HHV Infected Cell Polypeptide 0 (ICP0) gene is expressed very early during lytic infection, and for this reason is called an immediate-early Herpes gene. In 1991, Farrell and colleagues report that the 2.0-kb LAT intron terminates at the 5' end with a 750-base antisense RNA complement for the ICP0 gene.

In 2005, Quing-Yin Wang and colleagues from Harvard Medical School concluded, using assays comparing LAT-negative vs. LAT-positive virus strains, that expression of LAT in neurons represses the expression of several lytic gene products, including ICP4 and Thymidine Kinase. LAT expression results in changes to Histones, thus converting portions of viral DNA into a non-productive form known as heterochromatin.

Simian varicella virus (SVV) is a Varicellovirus (a Genus of Subfamily Alphaherpesvirinae) which expresses an HHV LAT homolog known as SVV LAT, and an HHV ICP0 analog known as SVV-ORF61 (Open Reading Frame). SVV LAT is encoded such that it contains an antisense copy of SVV-ORF61 and that expression of SVV LAT during latency downregulates expression of ORF61 and other immediate-early SVV gene products.

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