Selective inhibition of formation of suppressor glutamine tRNA in Moloney murine leukemia virus-infected NIH-3T3 cells by Avarol.

Avarol is a sesquiterpenoid hydroquinone, which displays no inhibitory potencies on mammalian DNA polymerases alpha, beta, and gamma, on mammalian RNA polymerases I, II, and III, or on reverse transcriptases from Moloney murine leukemia virus (Mo-MuLV) and from HIV. For a further elucidation of the antiviral effect of Avarol, we used NIH-3T3 cells infected with Mo-MuLV as a model system. The results show that in uninfected NIH-3T3 cells Avarol (i) causes a 50% reduction of the growth rate only at the high concentration of 29.6 microM and (ii) is accumulated in the cytoplasm close to the nucleus. At the much lower concentrations of 1-3 microM, Avarol causes an almost complete inhibition of viral progeny release. Moreover, it is shown that at 3 microM Avarol, the increase of the Mo-MuLV-induced UAG suppressor glutamine tRNA (tRNA(UmUGGln) was reduced to the normal level. Dot blot hybridization studies revealed that Avarol displays no inhibitory activity on cellular and viral mRNA synthesis. Taking the processing pathway of viral polyprotein Pr180gag,pol to p80 (reverse transcriptase) as an example, our Western blotting experiments showed that the final maturation process, conversion of p110 to p80, is inhibited in Avarol-treated cells. From these data we conclude that Avarol prevents the suppression of the UAG termination codon at the gag-pol junction of the retroviral genome. The functional consequence of this event is very likely an inhibition of the readthrough of the retroviral protease gene which overlaps the pol and gag genes, resulting in the reduction of the protease synthesis which is necessary for the viral proliferation.