title: The cysteines in position 1 and 86 of rat interferon-alpha 1 are indispensable for antiviral activity.
abstract: The human, bovine, murine and rat interferon (IFN)-alpha families contain 4 conserved cysteines located at positions 1, 29, 99 and 139 that are involved in disulfide bridges. Rat and murine IFN-alpha subspecies carry a fifth Cys (Cys-86) which is not conserved in bovine and human IFN-alpha subspecies except for human IFN-alpha 1. Changing Cys-86 in rat IFN-alpha 1 into Ser or Tyr virtually abolished antiviral activity. As shown by others, the substitution of Cys-86 to Ser in human IFN-alpha 1 had no pronounced effect on activity. This suggests that in contrast to human and bovine IFN-alpha, Cys-86 in rodent IFN-alpha plays a crucial role in receptor binding. Changing Cys-1 to Gly in rat IFN-alpha 1 also destroyed activity, in agreement with results obtained in the human IFN-alpha 1 system.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, University of Leiden, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: R A
authors.initials: RA
authors.lastname: Spanjaard
authors.forename: J A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: van Himbergen
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: van Duin
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D000998:Antiviral Agents; D001483:Base Sequence; D003545:Cysteine; D006801:Humans; D007370:Interferon Type I / Q000032:analysis / Q000494:pharmacology*; D051381:Rats
chemical_list: D000998:Antiviral Agents; D007370:Interferon Type I; D003545:Cysteine