Influence of Surface Protein V6 Region of Equine Infectious Anemia Virus on Cytokine Gene Expression

Equine infectious anemia virus (EIAV) is a member of the lentivirus group of the family Retroviridae. EIAV encodes a highly glycosylated SU (surface) protein with interspersed conserved and variable regions. The variable regions are thought to play a key role in virulence determination and virus neutralization. The role of SU in virulence is thought to be based on induction of cytokine gene expression upon binding of the virus to permissive cells leading to clinical signs that are associated with the infection. The proposed experiments will look specifically at one variable region (V6) of SU. My hypothesis was that V6 plays a major role in virulence by inducing cytokine induction upon binding. I used two EIAV strains with distinct phenotypes (virulent EIAV17 and avirulent EIAV19) to test the contribution of V6 to increased cytokine induction. The findings of these studies will aid in the long term goal of vaccine development and potential treatments for EIAV and other retroviruses.