How to train your virus: overcoming restrictions to HIV-1 tropism

How to train your virus: overcoming restrictions to HIV-1 tropism.

Speaker: Theodora Hatziioannou, The Rockefeller University

To replicate in a new host, lentiviruses must adapt to exploit required host factors and evade species-specific antiviral proteins. Understanding how host protein variation drives lentivirus adaptation allowed us to expand the host range of HIV-1 to pigtail macaques and derive a virus that can cause AIDS in this new host. We have demonstrated that engineering HIV-1 to overcome macaque APOBEC3 proteins was the crucial first step while subsequent in vivo replication, allowed the virus to acquire additional changes that improved replication. These studies have revealed the role of species-specific restriction factor in limiting lentivirus tropism and insights into their mechanism of action.