FEBS Letters
Volume 580, Issue 16, 10 July 2006, Pages 3829-3834
Edited by Hans-Dieter Klenk
Chia-Wei Lai, Zun-Ren Chan, Ding-Gang Yang, Wen-Hsin Lo, Yiu-Kay Lai, Margaret Dah-Tsyr Chang, Yu-Chen Hu
Abstract
It has been shown that severe acute respiratory syndrome-associated coronavirus (SARS-CoV) 3a and 7a proteins, but not membrane (M) protein, induce apoptosis in mammalian cells. Upon expression of SARS-CoV M protein using the baculovirus/insect cell expression system, however, we found that the expressed M protein triggered accelerated apoptosis in insect cells, as characterized by rapid cell death, elevated cytotoxicity, cell shrinkage, nuclear condensation and DNA fragmentation. Conversely, the M protein expressed in mammalian cells did not induce apoptosis. This is the first report describing the induction of apoptosis by SARS-CoV M protein in animal cells and possible implications are discussed.
Keywords
Apoptosis, Baculovirus, Insect cell, Membrane protein, SARS-CoV