Interaction of NCOR/SMRT Repressor Complexes with Papillomavirus E8^E2C Proteins Inhibits Viral Replication

Infections with high-risk human papillomaviruses (HR-HPV) such as HPV16 and 31 can lead to ano-genital and oropharyngeal cancers and HPV types from the beta genus have been implicated in the development of non-melanoma skin cancer. HPV replicate as nuclear extrachromosomal plasmids at low copy numbers in undifferentiated cells. HPV16 and 31 mutants have indicated that these viruses express an E8^E2C protein which negatively regulates genome replication. E8^E2C shares the DNA-binding and dimerization domain (E2C) with the essential viral replication activator E2 and the E8 domain replaces the replication/transcription activation domain of E2. The HR-HPV E8 domain is required for inhibiting viral transcription and the replication of the viral origin mediated by viral E1 and E2 proteins. We show now that E8^E2C also limits replication of HPV1, a mu-PV and HPV8, a beta-PV, in normal human keratinocytes. Proteomic analyses identified all NCoR/SMRT corepressor complex components (HDAC3, GPS2, NCoR, SMRT, TBL1 and TBLR1) as co-precipitating host cell proteins for HPV16 and 31 E8^E2C proteins. Co-immunoprecipitation and co-localization experiments revealed that NCoR/SMRT components interact with HPV1, 8, 16 and 31 E8^E2C proteins in an E8-dependent manner. SiRNA knock-down experiments confirm that NCoR/SMRT components are critical for both the inhibition of transcription and HPV origin replication by E8^E2C proteins. Furthermore, a dominant-negative NCoR fragment activates transcription and replication only from HPV16 and 31 wt but not from mutant genomes encoding NCoR/SMRT-binding deficient E8^E2C proteins. In summary, our data suggest that the repressive function of E8^E2C is highly conserved among HPV and that it is mediated by an E8-dependent interaction with NCoR/SMRT complexes. Our data also indicate for the first time that NCoR/SMRT complexes not only are involved in inhibiting cellular and viral transcription but also in controlling the replication of HPV origins.