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J Virol, April 1998, p. 2795-2805, Vol. 72, No. 4
0022-538X/98/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1998, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
Interferon Resistance of Hepatitis C Virus Genotype 1b:
Relationship to Nonstructural 5A Gene Quasispecies Mutations
Jean-Michel
Pawlotsky,1,2,*
Georgios
Germanidis,1,3
Avidan U.
Neumann,4
Muriel
Pellerin,1,2
Pierre-Olivier
Frainais,1 and
Daniel
Dhumeaux2,3
Department of Bacteriology and
Virology1 and
Department of Hepatology
and Gastroenterology,3 Hôpital Henri
Mondor, Université Paris XII, and
INSERM U99,
Hôpital Henri Mondor,2 94010 Créteil, France, and
Department of Life Sciences,
Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel4
Received 5 November 1997/Accepted 5 January 1998
A 40-amino-acid sequence located in the nonstructural 5A (NS5A)
protein of hepatitis C virus genotype 1b (HCV-1b) was recently suggested to be the interferon sensitivity-determining region (ISDR),
because HCV-1b strains with an ISDR amino acid sequence identical to
that of the prototype strain HCV-J were found to be resistant to alpha
interferon (IFN-
) whereas strains with amino acid substitutions were
found to be sensitive (N. Enomoto, I. Sakuma, Y. Asahina, M. Kurosaki,
T. Murakami, C. Yamamoto, N. Izumi, F. Marumo, and C. Sato,
J. Clin. Invest. 96:224-230, 1995; N. Enomoto, I. Sakuma, Y. Asahina, M. Kurosaki, T. Murakami, C. Yamamoto, Y. Ogura, N. Izumi, F. Marumo, and C. Sato, N. Engl. J. Med. 334:77-81,
1996). We used single-strand conformation polymorphism (SSCP)
analysis, combined with cloning and sequencing strategies, to
characterize NS5A quasispecies in HCV-1b-infected patients and
determine the relationships between pre- and posttreatment NS5A quasispecies mutations and the IFN-
sensitivity of HCV-1b. The
serine residues involved in phosphorylation of NS5A protein were highly
conserved both in the various patients and in quasispecies in a given
patient, suggesting that phosphorylation is important in NS5A protein
function. A hot spot for amino acid substitutions was found at
positions 2217 to 2218; it could be the result of either strong
selection pressure or tolerance to these amino acid replacements. The
proportion of synonymous mutations was significantly higher
than the proportion of nonsynonymous mutations, suggesting that genetic
variability in the region studied was the result of high mutation rates
and viral replication kinetics rather than of positive selection.
Sustained HCV RNA clearance was associated with low viral load and low
nucleotide sequence entropy, suggesting (i) that the replication
kinetics when treatment is started plays a critical role in HCV-1b
sensitivity to IFN-
and (ii) that HCV-1b resistance to IFN-
could
be conferred by numerous and/or related mutations that could be patient
specific and located at different positions throughout the viral genome
and could allow escape variants to be selected by IFN-
-stimulated
immune responses. No NS5A sequence appeared to be intrinsically
resistant or sensitive to IFN-
, but the HCV-J sequence was
significantly more frequent in nonresponder quasispecies than in
sustained virological responder quasispecies, suggesting that the
balance between NS5A quasispecies sequences in infected patients could
have a subtle regulatory influence on HCV replication.
*
Corresponding author. Mailing address: Service de
Bactériologie-Virologie, Hôpital Henri Mondor, 51 ave. du
maréchal de Lattre de Tassigny, 94010 Créteil, France.
Phone: (33) 1.49.81.28.26. Fax: (33) 1.49.81.28.39. E-mail:
pawlotsky{at}univ-paris12.fr.
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