“…In order to elicit a productive infection, viral DNA ampli®cation needs to be controlled and it is plausible that the activity of E6* could ensure the presence of a limited amount of p53 at the replication sites, where it could both prevent overreplication of the viral genome and, possibly, assist DNA synthesis by means of its proofreading capacity. Indeed, HPV recruits DNA polymerase a for DNA replication, and the 3' ± 5' exonuclease activity of p53 could enhance the replicative ®delity of this enzyme (for review, Albrechtsen et al, 1999). It is interesting to note that p53 has been found in the replication centres of Herpes Simplex Virus (Wilcock and Lane, 1991), Cytomegalovirus (Fortunato and Spector, 1998) and Adenovirus (KoÈ nig et al, 1999), and recent studies reported an interaction between the HPV ori-complex binding protein E2 and p53, further suggesting a potential positive role for p53 in viral replication (Massimi et al, 1999).…”