Discovery Could Lead to an Animal Model for Hepatitis C

Rockefeller University scientists have identified a protein that allows the Hepatitis C virus to enter mouse cells, a finding that represents the clearest path yet for developing a much-needed vaccine, as well as tailored treatments for the virus.

By using a genetic screen, the group, led by Charles M. Rice, head of the Laboratory of Virology and Infectious Disease, identified a human protein, called occludin, that makes mouse cells susceptible to the virus. The discovery means that scientists now have the complete list of cellular factors — a total of four — that are required for the virus to enter nonhuman cells.

The hepatitis C virus exclusively targets human liver cells, suggesting that these cells express genes that allow uptake of the virus, genes that are not expressed in other human and nonhuman cells, explains Rice. In past years, three proteins — CD81, CLDN1, and SR-BI — were identified as having key roles in shuttling the virus into cells, but something was clearly missing. Rice’s group found that even when they engineered mouse cells to overexpress all three proteins, the cells still denied the virus entry.

The discovery of occludin, however, has changed that. When Rice and his colleagues engineered mouse and human cell lines to express all four proteins, they showed that each cell line became infectible with the virus. To further establish occludin’s role as a required entry factor, the group showed that human liver cells naturally express high levels of occludin, and that by silencing its expression, they could give these once highly susceptible liver cells the ability to completely block infection.

In their DNA screen, the team first cloned all the genes that were expressed in liver cells and then delivered them to mouse cells.

Since mice and humans each have a species-specific version of the four factors, the group used hamster cells to see which combination of factors did the best job at making the cells infectible. They found that in the case of two of the proteins, occludin and CD81, only the human versions worked; for SR-BI and CLDN1, the human and mouse versions did an equally good job. These experiments not only suggest that there may be more than one potential animal model, but also that there are several specific combinations of entry factors that could generate them.

‘This work provides a clear foundation upon which we can now begin to construct an animal model for the uniquely human pathogen,’ says Rice. ‘This is only a first step but in terms of creating an animal model for hepatitis C, it’s a big leap forward.’

Release Date: January 28, 2009
Source: Rockefeller University