2005 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary
Multiphase analysis of HIV-1 inner-virion structures.
| Project/Area Number |
16590386
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Section | 一般 |
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| Research Field |
Virology
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| Research Institution | Osaka University |
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Principal Investigator |
SAKURAGI Jun-ichi Osaka University, Research Institute for Microbial Diseases, Research Associate, 微生物病研究所, 助手 (90273705)
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| Project Period (FY) |
2004 – 2005
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| Keywords | HIV-1 / Retrovirus / RNA / Packaging / Dimerization / Virion |
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| Research Abstract |
The genomic RNA of retrovirus, including the primate lentivirus such as HIV, always form dimers in matured virions. It is likely that the presence of two genomes in one virion is advantageous for survival, providing an extra template that can be used when one RNA molecule is damaged, and/or giving genetic variety to their progeny. However, these ideas might not fully explain why the virion have to carry multiple identical RNAs in spite of the severe limitation of the space. We developed and utilized a novel system to investigate viral RNA dimerization in virion clearly and simply without affecting RNA packaging. The results of precise mapping of dimerization functional region strongly suggested that the RNA dimerization is one of the essential steps of RNA packaging.
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