title: Trans-cellular introduction of HIV-1 protein Nef induces pathogenic response in Caenorhabditis elegans.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Caenorhabditis elegans has emerged as a very powerful model for studying the host pathogen interactions. Despite the absence of a naturally occurring viral infection for C. elegans, the model is now being exploited experimentally to study the basic aspects of virus-host interplay. The data generated from recent studies suggests that the virus that infects mammalian cells does infect, replicate and accumulate in C. elegans.
  
  
  RESULTS
  We took advantage of the easy-to-achieve protein introduction in C. elegans and employing the methodology, we administered HIV-1 protein Nef into live worms. Nef is known to be an important protein for exacerbating HIV-1 pathogenesis in host by enhancing viral replication. The deletion of nef from the viral genome has been reported to inhibit its replication in the host, thereby leading to delayed pathogenesis. Our studies, employing Nef introduction into C. elegans, led to creation of an in-vivo model that allowed us to study, whether or not, the protein induces effect in the whole organism. We observed a marked lipodystrophy, effect on neuromuscular function, impaired fertility and reduced longevity in the worms exposed to Nef. The observed effects resemble to those observed in Nef transgenic mice and most interestingly the effects also relate to some of the pathogenic aspects exhibited by human AIDS patients.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Our studies underline the importance of this in vivo model for studying the interactions of Nef with host proteins, which could further be used for identifying possible inhibitors of such interactions.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Functional Genomics and Molecular Toxicology, Division of Toxicology, Central Drug Research Institute (CSIR), Lucknow, India. anazir@cdri.res.in
authors.forename: Aamir
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Nazir
authors.forename: Shreesh Raj
authors.initials: SR
authors.lastname: Sammi
authors.forename: Pankaj
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Singh
authors.forename: Raj Kamal
authors.initials: RK
authors.lastname: Tripathi
mesh_terms: D000163:Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome / Q000821:virology; D000818:Animals; D017173:Caenorhabditis elegans; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D015658:HIV Infections / Q000235:genetics*; D015497:HIV-1 / Q000378:metabolism*; D006801:Humans; D007150:Immunohistochemistry / Q000379:methods; D008060:Lipodystrophy / Q000378:metabolism; D051379:Mice; D008822:Mice, Transgenic; D010078:Oxazines / Q000494:pharmacology; D010641:Phenotype; D013696:Temperature; D054311:nef Gene Products, Human Immunodeficiency Virus / Q000378:metabolism*
chemical_list: D010078:Oxazines; D054311:nef Gene Products, Human Immunodeficiency Virus; C514837:nef protein, Human immunodeficiency virus 1; C044808:nile red