Serine- and Arginine-rich Proteins 55 and 75 (SRp55 and SRp75) Induce Production of HIV-1 vpr mRNA by Inhibiting the 5′-Splice Site of Exon 3

Abstract

HIV-1 non-coding exon 3 can either be spliced to exons 4, 4a, 4b, 4c, and 5 to generate tat, rev, and nef mRNAs or remain unspliced to produce the 13a7 vpr mRNA. Here we show that serine-and arginine-rich proteins 55 and 75 (SRp55 and SRp75) inhibit splicing from the 5-splice site of exon 3 thereby causing an accumulation of the partially unspliced 13a7 vpr mRNA. In contrast, serineand arginine-rich protein 40 (SRp40) induces splicing from exon 3 to exon 4, thereby promoting the production of the 1347 tat mRNA. We demonstrate that SRp55 stimulates vpr mRNA production by interacting with the previously identified HIV-1 splicing enhancer named GAR and inhibiting its function. This inhibition requires both serine arginine-rich and RNA-binding domains of SRp55, indicating that production of HIV-1 vpr mRNA depends on the interaction of SRp55 with an unknown factor.To produce all the mRNAs that are needed for HIV-1 to be infectious it uses alternative splicing. The full-length 9-kb transcript contains several splice sites, including four 5Ј-splice sites, also called splice donors (SD1-4) 2 and eight 3Ј-splice sites, also called splice acceptors (SA2-3, -4a-c, -5, and -7) (supplemental Fig. 1A), which can all be used in different combinations to create more than 35 differently spliced mRNAs (supplemental Fig. 1, B and C) (1-6). Cloning and expression of individual HIV-1 mRNAs have revealed that mRNAs spliced to SA3 produce Vpr, those spliced to SA4 produce Tat, those spliced to SA4a and -4b produce Rev and Nef, and those spliced to SA5 produce Nef (1,2,7,8). mRNAs spliced to SA2 are believed to produce Vif (5, 7). Two additional mRNAs that are believed to produce Rev and Nef are spliced to SA4c or to SA7, respectively (4). To produce the correct amounts of all mRNAs, the splice acceptors in HIV-1 are sub-optimal because of short and interrupted polypyrimidine tracts, non-canonical branch points, and inhibitory sequences that down-regulate the usage of several splice sites (6, 9 -13).Enhancer or silencer sequences regulate alternative splicing by up-regulating or down-regulating the usage of a splice site (14). Generally, the family of serine-and arginine-rich proteins (SR proteins) target enhancer sequences, and silencer sequences are targeted by heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoproteins (15). There are several enhancers and silencers on HIV-1 pre-mRNA (16). A silencer in exon 3 called ESSV inhibits the vpr splice acceptor SA3 (10, 17). Two silencers in exon 4, named ESS2 and ESS2p, inhibit splicing into exon 4 thereby inhibiting the production of tat mRNA (18,19). SA7 is used by all mRNAs in the 2-kb class. In exon 7 a silencer called ESS3 blocks U2 small nuclear ribonucleoprotein, thereby suppressing SA7 (19 -21). An intronic silencer that blocks SA7 is located in the intron, directly upstream of exon 7 (22). An enhancer element called ESE3 that activates SA7 is located close to ESS3 in exon 7 (9, 21, 23). An enhancer in exon 4 has been named ESE2, because it attenuates ESS2 and thereby enhances splicing into SA4 (24)...

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