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. 2005 Jun;126(1-2):65-74.
doi: 10.1016/j.jviromet.2005.01.022.

Expression and spectroscopic analysis of a mutant hepatitis B virus onco-protein HBx without cysteine residues

Edmilson Rui  1 , Patricia Ribeiro de Moura, Kaliandra de Almeida Gonçalves, Jörg Kobarg
Affiliations

Expression and spectroscopic analysis of a mutant hepatitis B virus onco-protein HBx without cysteine residues

Edmilson Rui et al. J Virol Methods. 2005 Jun.

Abstract

Chronic infection of the hepatitis B virus (HBV) is one of the causes leading to liver cancer. The 3.2kb genome of HBV encodes four proteins: core antigen, surface antigen, a DNA polymerase and the X protein (HBx). The biological functions of HBx are not fully understood. It has been shown that HBx is a potent trans-activator, which activates transcription of many cellular and viral promoters indirectly via protein-protein interactions. These transactivating activities of HBx may contribute to the development of hepatocellular carcinoma. In this paper a truncated mini-HBx(-Cys) (18-142) protein, where the cysteines had been either deleted or substituted by serines, was constructed by site-directed mutagenesis and overexpressed as a 6xHis fusion protein in Escherichia coli. The 6xHis-mini-HBx(-Cys) protein was isolated from inclusion bodies, purified by Ni-affinity chromatography under denaturing conditions and refolded by sequential dialysis. The structure of the 6xHis-mini-HBx(-Cys) protein was analyzed by circular dichroism, fluorescence and one-dimensional NMR spectroscopic assays. The data presented here suggest that HBx is unstructured but has a propensity to gain secondary structure under specific experimental conditions. Its conformational flexibility might partially explain its functional complexity, namely its capacity to interact with a wide array of signaling proteins, transcriptional regulators and nucleic acids.

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