title: Analysis of the VPg-proteinase (NIa) encoded by tobacco etch potyvirus: effects of mutations on subcellular transport, proteolytic processing, and genome amplification.
abstract: A mutational analysis was conducted to investigate the functions of the tobacco etch potyvirus VPg-proteinase (NIa) protein in vivo. The NIa N-terminal domain contains the VPg attachment site, whereas the C-terminal domain contains a picornavirus 3C-like proteinase. Cleavage at an internal site separating the two domains occurs in a subset of NIa molecules. The majority of NIa molecules in TEV-infected cells accumulate within the nucleus. By using a reporter fusion strategy, the NIa nuclear localization signal was mapped to a sequence within amino acid residues 40 to 49 in the VPg domain. Mutations resulting in debilitation of NIa nuclear translocation also debilitated genome amplification, suggesting that the NLS overlaps a region critical for RNA replication. The internal cleavage site was shown to be a poor substrate for NIa proteolysis because of a suboptimal sequence context around the scissile bond. Mutants that encoded NIa variants with accelerated internal proteolysis exhibited genome amplification defects, supporting the hypothesis that slow internal processing provides a regulatory function. Mutations affecting the VPg attachment site and proteinase active-site residues resulted in amplification-defective viruses. A transgenic complementation assay was used to test whether NIa supplied in trans could rescue amplification-defective viral genomes encoding altered NIa proteins. Neither cells expressing NIa alone nor cells expressing a series of NIa-containing polyproteins supported increased levels of amplification of the mutants. The lack of complementation of NIa-defective mutants is in contrast to previous results obtained with RNA polymerase (NIb)-defective mutants, which were relatively efficiently rescued in the transgenic complementation assay. It is suggested that, unlike NIb polymerase, NIa provides replicative functions that are cis preferential.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas 77843, USA.
authors.forename: M C
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Schaad
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Haldeman-Cahill
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Cronin
authors.forename: J C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Carrington
mesh_terms: D001692:Biological Transport / Q000235:genetics; D010450:Endopeptidases; D005784:Gene Amplification; D016679:Genome, Viral; D009154:Mutation; D010947:Plants, Toxic; D017800:Potyvirus / Q000201:enzymology*; D014026:Nicotiana / Q000821:virology*; D014764:Viral Proteins / Q000235:genetics* / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D014764:Viral Proteins; D010450:Endopeptidases; C059992:nuclear inclusion protein a, mosaic viruses