Cargando…

The Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) Coronavirus NTPase/Helicase Belongs to a Distinct Class of 5′ to 3′ Viral Helicases

The putative NTPase/helicase protein from severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) is postulated to play a number of crucial roles in the viral life cycle, making it an attractive target for anti-SARS therapy. We have cloned, expressed, and purified this protein as an N-terminal hexa...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Tanner, Julian A., Watt, Rory M., Chai, Yu-Bo, Lu, Lin-Yu, Lin, Marie C., Peiris, J.S.Malik, Poon, Leo L.M., Kung, Hsiang-Fu, Huang, Jian-Dong
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: ASBMB. Currently published by Elsevier Inc; originally published by American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. 2003
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8060950/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12917423
http://dx.doi.org/10.1074/jbc.C300328200
Descripción
Sumario:The putative NTPase/helicase protein from severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) is postulated to play a number of crucial roles in the viral life cycle, making it an attractive target for anti-SARS therapy. We have cloned, expressed, and purified this protein as an N-terminal hexahistidine fusion in Escherichia coli and have characterized its helicase and NTPase activities. The enzyme unwinds double-stranded DNA, dependent on the presence of a 5′ single-stranded overhang, indicating a 5′o 3′ polarity of activity, a distinct characteristic of coronaviridae helicases. We provide the first quantitative analysis of the polynucleic acid binding and NTPase activities of a Nidovirus helicase, using a high throughput phosphate release assay that will be readily adaptable to the future testing of helicase inhibitors. All eight common NTPs and dNTPs were hydrolyzed by the SARS helicase in a magnesium-dependent reaction, stimulated by the presence of either single-stranded DNA or RNA. The enzyme exhibited a preference for ATP, dATP, and dCTP over the other NTP/dNTP substrates. Homopolynucleotides significantly stimulated the ATPase activity (15–25-fold) with the notable exception of poly(G) and poly(dG), which were non-stimulatory. We found a large variation in the apparent strength of binding of different homopolynucleotides, with dT(24) binding over 10 times more strongly than dA(24) as observed by the apparent K(m) .