Sequence conservation within the major capsid protein of human papillomavirus (HPV) type 18 and formation of HPV-18 virus-like particles in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

• Published in: Journal of general virology 1996-03, Vol.77 (3), p.465-468
• Main Authors: Hofmann, Kathryn J, Neeper, Michael P, Markus, Henry Z, Brown, Darron R, Muller, Martin, Jansen, Kathrin U
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Base Sequence; Capsid - genetics; Capsid - ultrastructure; Cloning, Molecular; Conserved Sequence; DNA, Viral - genetics; Humans; Molecular Sequence Data; Papillomaviridae - genetics; Papillomaviridae - isolation & purification; Papillomaviridae - ultrastructure; Recombinant Proteins - genetics; Recombinant Proteins - ultrastructure; Saccharomyces cerevisiae; Tumor Cells, Cultured
• ISSN: 0022-1317; 1465-2099
• DOI: 10.1099/0022-1317-77-3-465

1 Department of Virus and Cell Biology, Merck Research Laboratories, Sumneytown Pike, West Point, Pennsylvania 19486 2 Division of Infectious Diseases, Indiana University School of Medicine and Roudebush Veterans Administration Medical Center, Indianapolis, Indiana 46202-5124 and 3 Loyola University Medical Center, Maywood, Illinois 60153, USA The major capsid protein L1 of human papillomaviruses (HPVs) has been identified as a promising candidate antigen for a prophylactic HPV vaccine. Since amino acid sequence heterogeneity has been demonstrated for the L1 genes within individual HPV types, nucleotide sequences for L1 were determined from six HPV-18 clinical isolates and the cervical carcinoma cell line SW756 and compared to the published HPV-18 prototype sequence. The sequences were almost identical between the clinical isolates and SW756 but differed markedly from the published prototype sequence. Resequencing the prototype HPV-18 revealed that these differences were due to sequencing artifacts of the prototype HPV-18 sequence archived in GenBank. Thus, the HPV-18 L1 genes seem to display a very high level of sequence conservation. The HPV-18 L1 gene derived from SW756 was expressed in Saccharomyces cerevisiae and self-assembly of the L1 protein into viruslike particles was demonstrated. * Author for correspondence. Fax [phone]. e-mail [e-mail] Received 22 August 1995; accepted 31 October 1995.