The human papillomavirus18 E7 protein inhibits CENP-C binding to α-satellite DNA

Human papillomavirus (HPV) infection leads to aneuploidy, a numerical chromosomal aberration that is caused by dysregulation of chromosomal segregation. We previously found that the E7 proteins of high-risk HPVs, but not of low-risk HPVs, could bind to centromere protein-C (CENP-C). In this study, we first found that CENP-C could bind centromere α-satellite DNAs using ChIP analysis and HA-tagged CENP-C/nuc transfected 293T cells. We then investigated if HA-CENP-C/nuc binding to α-satellite DNAs was affected by the E7 proteins of high- or low-risk HPVs. We found that transfection of the FLAG tagged HPV18 E7 inhibited the binding of HA-CENP-C/nuc to α-satellite DNAs. This finding was confirmed in HeLa S3 cells transfected with siRNA targeted to HPV18 E7 expression. We therefore speculate that altered function of kinetochores as a result of inhibition of CENP-C and α-satellite DNAs binding may be associated with the chromosomal abnormalities observed in HPV18-positive cancers.