Purification and biophysical properties of human coronavirus 229E

Coronavirus 229E was grown to high titers in diploid fibroblast cells under medium containing twice the normal concentrations of amino acids and vitamins. Growth curves showed maximum virus production at multiplicities of infection of 0.1 and 1; maximum titers of intracellular virus occurred at 22–24 hr and of extracellular virus at 26 hr postadsorption. Tube infectivity titers ranged from 10(9.0)–10(9.5) TCID(50)/ml and plaque titers from 10(10.2)–10(10.9) y PFU/ml at the time of peak virus production, when no cytopathology was evident. Virus titer dropped rapidly between 26 and 56 hr, coincident with increasing cytopathology. A single precipitin band was observed in immunodiffusion and immunoelectrophoresis between concentrated virus preparations and antiserum to purified 229E. Neuraminidase and hemagglutinin assays were negative. Virus was purified by two procedures: adsorption to and elution from human “0” erythrocytes and CaHPO(4) gel followed by equilibrium sucrose gradient centrifugation, and PEG precipitation followed by equilibrium glycerol/tartrate gradients and rate zonal sucrose or glycerol/tartrate gradients. Final lots of purified virus containing <0.02% of the crude tissue culture proteins had absorption maxima at 256 nm and minima at 241.2 nm and a mean extinction coefficient of E(1cm)(1%) = 54.3 at 256 nm. The fully corrected sedimentation coefficient for the intact virion was S(20,v)(0) = 381 S. PAGE by different techniques revealed seven polypeptides of mean apparent molecular weights between 16,900 and 196,100. Six contained carbohydrate and one contained lipid. Electropherograms of (3)H- and (14)C-labeled virus were identical to those of stained gels. Two glycoproteins constituting 25% of the virion protein were identified by bromelin digestion as the spike proteins. The density in sucrose and in potassium tartrate was 1.18 g/ml for the virion and 1.15 g/ml for the “despiked” particle.