The gIII glycoprotein of pseudorabies virus is involved in two distinct steps of virus attachment.

The entry of herpesviruses into cells involves two distinct stages: attachment or adsorption to the cell surface followed by internalization. The virus envelope glycoproteins have been implicated in both stages. Pseudorabies virus attaches to cells by an early interaction that involves the viral glycoprotein gIII and a cellular heparinlike substance. We examined the role of gIII in the attachment process by analysis of a set of viruses carrying defined gIII mutations. The initial attachment of gIII mutants with an internal deletion of 134 amino acids (PrV2) to MDBK cells was indistinguishable from that of wild-type virus. The adsorption of these mutants was, however, much more sensitive than that of wild-type virus to competing heparin. Furthermore, while attachment of wild-type virus to MDBK cells led to a rapid loss of sensitivity to heparin, this was not the case with PrV2, which could be displaced from the cell surface by heparin after it had attached to the cells. We conclude that glycoprotein gIII is involved in two distinct steps of virus attachment and that the second of these steps but not the first is defective in PrV2.