The interaction between human cytomegalovirus immediate-early gene 2 (IE2) protein and heterogeneous...

Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) is an ubiquitous pathogen which causes significant illness in immunocompromised individuals. The immediate-early gene 2 (IE2) protein of HCMV plays an important role in the regulation of virus replication. Previous studies have shown that the IE2 protein is able to interact with several cellular proteins, but many of the IE2 interacting partners remain unidentified. By utilizing the yeast two-hybrid system, the heterogeneous ribonucleoprotein A1 (hnRNP A1) was identified as an IE2 interacting protein. The interaction was confirmed via the in vitro binding of bacterial expressed glutathione S-transferase (GST) IE2 fusion protein with the in vitro translated hnRNP A1. The mutational analysis showed that both the N-terminal half (1-290 residues) and C-terminal half (291-579 residues) of IE2 protein can interact with the hnRNP A1, indicating that more than one region of IE2 protein are involved in the binding with hnRNP A1.