Innate immunity against viruses and viral evasion strategies Flashcards
What are the components to innate antiviral immunity?
Barriers at sites of microbe entry
Intrinsic defences
Phagocytosis
Complement
Inflammatory response
Cytokines and interferon
NK cells
What are the sites of microbe entry?
Conjuctiva
Respiratory tract
Alimentary tract
Urogenital tract
Anus
Skin
Arthropod
Capillary
Scratch/injury
What are the physical barriers?
Skin
Mucosal surfaces
What are the chemical barriers?
pH
Secreted factors
What are sentinel cells?
Any cell that has a prominent role in host defence
e.g. macrophages, DCs
What are the intrinsic defences?
Apoptosis
Restriction facotrs/intrinsic immunity
Epigenetic silencing
RNA silencing
Autophagy/Xenophagy
Why is apoptosis bad for the virus?
It prevents completion of the life cycle and triggers surface signals for clearance by macrophages
How does adenovirus evade apoptosis?
E1B-19K protein expressed by adenovirus counteracts E1A-induced intrinsic apoptosis
It is a viral BCL-2 homologue
Prevents oligomerisation of BAX and BAD, preventing mitochondrial pore formation and no cytochrome c, Smac release
XIAP will therefore inhibit apoptosis by binding to effector caspases
How does Kaposi’s sarcoma-associated herpesvirus (HHV-8) evade apoptosis?
Viral Bcl-2 homologue inhibits mitochondrial pore formation by binding BAK
vFLIP protein blocks interaction of death receptor-adaptor complex with cellular effector FLICE (procaspase-8), which prevents initiation of caspase cascade
vIAP protein binds to apoptosome and prevents activation of effector caspases
What are restriction factors?
Host cellular proteins that act as a frontline defence against viral infections
They recognise and interfere with stages of the replication cycle of viruses and therefore block infection
Name some restriction factors
APOBEC3G
TRIM5a
Tetherin
SAMHD1
Describe APOBEC3G
A highly potent ssDNA cytidine deaminase
Associates with nascent HIV nucelocapsids and is incorporated into new virions
When these virions infect other cells and the viral transcription complex is formed, APOBEC3G deaminates cytidine to uridine, forming hypermutated defective proviruses or are degraded so cannot cause infection
Describe TRIM5a
Targets incoming capsids to proteasomes
Very species-specific
Block retroviral infections by binding viral capsids and preventing reverse transcription
Prevent uncoating of virus
How does tetherin work?
Blocks budding by enveloped viruses
Describe SAMHD1
A phosphohydrolase that converts dNTPs to inorganic phosphate and depletes the pool of dNTPs available to reverse transcriptase
How does HIV evade restriction factors?
Vpu protein removes tetherin from the cell surface
Vif impairs translation and intacellular stability of APOBEC3G
Vpx protein counteracts SAMHD1 to allow reverse transcription
What is epigenetic silencing?
A nuclear event where foreign DNA molecules that enter the cell are quickly organised into transcriptionally silent chromatin
Involves PML bodies
Silences DNA viruses e.g. adenoviruses and herpesviruses
What do large DNA viruses encode?
Proteins that prevent deposition of inhibitory histones and other chromatin compounds onto viral DNA
Describe phagocytosis as a component of innate viral immunity
Carried out in vertebrates by DCs, macrophages and neutrophils
Clears pathogens but also presents peptides on MHCs - this promotes development of reactivation of the adaptive immune system
How do phagocytes see viruses?
Macrophages have phagocytic receptors that bind microbes and their components
e.g. mannose receptor, complement receptor, lipid receptor, dectin-1, scavenger receptor
How does complement bind to some viruses in an antibody-dependent manner?
Classical pathway via direct binding of C1q to the envelope glycoproteins of some viruses
Lectin pathway via binding of MBL to viral surface carbohydrates
Alternative pathway on enveloped viruses
How do viruses evade complement?
Complement control proteins incorporated into envelope
Can be passive or active
Give examples of active evasion of complement
Vaccinia C3L gene product VCP is a complement control protein that binds to and inactivates C3b and C4b
Vaccinia B5R product recruits host complement control proteins into the envelope
KSHV-encoded KCP is incorporated into the virion and enhances the decay of classical C3 convertase and induces the degradation of activated complement factors C4b and C3b by a serine proteinase factor I
What is pinocytosis?
Cell ‘drinking’ - ingestion of liquid into a cell by budding of small vesicles from the cell membrane
Anything taken up by cells in pinocytosis is cleared by proteolysis and presented on the surface through MHC