AUTHOR=Gelmez Nazife , Çağlayan Elif , Turan Kadir TITLE=The interaction of influenza A virus RNA polymerase PA subunit with the human β-actin protein JOURNAL=Acta Virologica VOLUME=67 YEAR=2024 URL=https://www.frontierspartnerships.org/journals/acta-virologica/articles/10.3389/av.2023.11890 DOI=10.3389/av.2023.11890 ISSN=1336-2305 ABSTRACT=

Influenza A viruses are enveloped viruses with a genome of eight single-stranded negative-sense RNA molecules. In virions, RNA segments are found as vRNPs associated with NP proteins. The RdRp enzyme, which catalyzes the replication/transcription of the viral genome, is carried as attached to vRNPs. In this study, it was demonstrated that the PA subunit of the viral RdRp interacts with β-actin proteins by the yeast two-hybrid assay. It was shown that the amino-terminal domains of the β-actin protein bind to the carboxy-terminal moiety of the viral PA protein in the mammalian cells. The results were supported by in silico analysis. Over-expression of the β-actin protein was found to have a negative effect on the viral RdRp activity in mini-replicon, but its mechanism of action has remained unknown. The results suggest that the interaction of β-actin and PA protein, a component of vRNPs, may have a role in the intracellular trafficking of the influenza vRNPs and/or viral transcription.