). To further characterize cell cycle arrest during B19V infection of EPCs, we analyzed the cell cycle change using 5-bromo-2=-deoxyuridine (BrdU) pulse-labeling and DAPI (4=,6-diamidino-2-phenylindole) staining, which precisely establishes the cell cycle pattern based on both cellular DNA replication and nuclear DNA content. We found that although both B19V NS1 transduction and infection immediately arrested cells at a status of 4 N DNA content, B19V-infected 4 N cells still incorporated BrdU, indicating active DNA synthesis. Notably, the BrdU incorporation was caused neither by viral DNA replication nor by cellular DNA repair that could be initiated by B19V infection-induced cellular DNA damage. Moreover, several S phase regulators were abundantly expressed and colocalized within the B19V replication centers. More importantly, replication of the B19V wild-type infectious DNA, as well as the M20 mTAD2 mutant, arrested cells at S phase. Taken together, our results confirmed that B19V infection triggers late S phase arrest, which presumably provides cellular S phase factors for viral DNA replication.
Human parvovirus B19 (B19V) is a member of the genus Erythrovirus within the family Parvoviridae. Most commonly, it causes a mild disease called "fifth disease" (1); however, under some conditions, B19V infection can be life threatening (2), e.g., hydrops fetalis in pregnant women (3-5), chronic pure red cell aplasia in immunocompromised patients (6, 7), and transient aplastic crisis in sickle cell disease patients (8-10).B19V has a single-stranded DNA genome that is flanked by two identical terminal repeats (11). Under a single p6 promoter, the B19V genome expresses one large nonstructural protein (NS1), two small (11-kDa and 7.5-kDa) nonstructural proteins, and two capsid proteins (VP1 and VP2) (12). B19V infection is restricted to human erythroid progenitor cells (EPCs) of human bone marrow and the fetal liver (5, 13-15). Previously, only a few semipermissive cell lines, such as the human megakaryoblastoid cell line UT7/Epo-S1 (16, 17), were found to support B19V replication. Recently, ex vivo-expanded human primary CD36 ϩ EPCs, which are differentiated from CD34 ϩ hematopoietic stem cells, have been shown to be highly permissive to B19V infection (18)(19)(20). Although B19V replication in UT7/Epo-S1 cells is less efficient (21, 22), the cells can be transfected with a B19V infectious DNA (M20) (23) and produce infectious virions under hypoxic conditions (22).B19V infection of both UT7/Epo-S1 cells and CD36 ϩ EPCs quickly arrests host cells in a tetraploid state (4 N DNA content) (17,24,25), which was previously thought to be "G 2 /M arrest." Expression of B19V NS1 per se in CD36ϩ EPCs was identified as capable of inducing EPCs arrested at a 4 N DNA content through deregulation of the E2F family transcription factors (24). However, it is generally accepted that autonomous parvoviruses rely on host cells at S phase for viral DNA amplification (26-32), because of the simplicity of parvovirus genome structures. In ad...