Lai Chia-Wei, Chan Zun-Ren, Yang Ding-Gang, Lo Wen-Hsin, Lai Yiu-Kay, Chang Margaret Dah-Tsyr, Hu Yu-Chen
Department of Chemical Engineering, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu 300, Taiwan.
FEBS Lett. 2006 Jul 10;580(16):3829-34. doi: 10.1016/j.febslet.2006.06.003. Epub 2006 Jun 14.
It has been shown that severe acute respiratory syndrome-associated coronavirus (SARS-CoV) 3a and 7a proteins, but not membrane (M) protein, induce apoptosis in mammalian cells. Upon expression of SARS-CoV M protein using the baculovirus/insect cell expression system, however, we found that the expressed M protein triggered accelerated apoptosis in insect cells, as characterized by rapid cell death, elevated cytotoxicity, cell shrinkage, nuclear condensation and DNA fragmentation. Conversely, the M protein expressed in mammalian cells did not induce apoptosis. This is the first report describing the induction of apoptosis by SARS-CoV M protein in animal cells and possible implications are discussed.
研究表明，严重急性呼吸综合征相关冠状病毒（SARS-CoV）的3a和7a蛋白而非膜（M）蛋白可诱导哺乳动物细胞凋亡。然而，利用杆状病毒/昆虫细胞表达系统表达SARS-CoV M蛋白后，我们发现所表达的M蛋白可引发昆虫细胞加速凋亡，其特征为细胞快速死亡、细胞毒性升高、细胞收缩、核浓缩和DNA片段化。相反，在哺乳动物细胞中表达的M蛋白不会诱导凋亡。这是首篇描述SARS-CoV M蛋白在动物细胞中诱导凋亡的报告，并对其可能的影响进行了讨论。
