Difference in Bgp-independent fusion activity among mouse hepatitis viruses

Mouse hepatitis virus (MHV) utilizes a mouse biliary glycoprotein (Bgp) as a receptor. Co-cultivation of MHV-nonpermissive hamster BHK cells devoid of mouse Bgp with mouse DBT cells infected with MHV-A59 or JHMV induces syncytia formation on BHK cells (Bgp-independent fusion). This study shows the difference in Bgp-independent fusion activity among various MHV strains. Under a phase contrast microscopy, JHMV (cl-2, sp-4) induced the Bgp-independent syncytia on BHK cells similar to those observed on DBT cells, while such syncytia were not seen with the infection of other MHV strains (MHV-1, MHV-3, MHV-A59, MHV-S, srr7, srr11 and srr18). Tiny syncytia detectable only by immunofluorescence were produced with the latter MHV strains except for srr7 which failed to produce syncytia. MHVs except for srr7 grew in BHK cells after Bgp-independent infection. The Bgp-independent fusion by JHMV was inhibited either by anti-S1 or anti-S2 antibodies. These results showed that the JHMV spike protein had a remarkably high Bgp-independent fusion activity.