Ehrengruber Markus U
Brain Research Institute, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.
Brain Res Bull. 2002 Oct 15;59(1):13-22. doi: 10.1016/s0361-9230(02)00858-4.
Semliki Forest virus (SFV), Sindbis virus (SIN), and Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus are simple, enveloped plus-strand RNA viruses belonging to the Alphavirus genus of the Togaviridae family. They have been developed into expression vectors that infect a wide host cell range and cause rapid and high-level transgene expression. Their easy and fast generation, classification into biosafety levels 1 and 2, and preferential transduction of neurons in cell and tissue cultures makes them an increasingly used gene transfer system. This review summarizes the alphaviral replication and expression, the replicon system, and its application in neurobiology. Alphaviral vectors can introduce multiple transgenes into host cells, and mutants with low or absent cytotoxicity and increased or decreased transgene expression levels are available. Temperature-dependent mutants permit to control the host cell specificity as well as the on- and offset of gene expression. These features, together with the transduction characteristics revealed in a direct comparison of alphaviral and other viral vectors in hippocampal slice cultures, make SFV and SIN vectors a powerful tool for neurobiological studies.
辛德毕斯病毒（Semliki Forest virus，SFV）、辛德毕斯病毒（Sindbis virus，SIN）和委内瑞拉马脑炎病毒是简单的、有包膜的正链RNA病毒，属于披膜病毒科甲病毒属。它们已被开发成表达载体，可感染广泛的宿主细胞，并能快速且高水平地表达转基因。它们易于快速产生，被归类为生物安全1级和2级，并且在细胞和组织培养中优先转导神经元，这使得它们成为越来越常用的基因转移系统。本综述总结了甲病毒的复制与表达、复制子系统及其在神经生物学中的应用。甲病毒载体可将多个转基因导入宿主细胞，并且有细胞毒性低或无细胞毒性以及转基因表达水平升高或降低的突变体。温度依赖性突变体可用于控制宿主细胞特异性以及基因表达的开启和关闭。这些特性，连同在海马脑片培养中对甲病毒载体与其他病毒载体进行直接比较时所揭示的转导特征，使得SFV和SIN载体成为神经生物学研究的有力工具。
