Protein Trafficking and Membrane Biology During Viral Infection
Herpes viruses cause many human diseases, including blindness,
birth defects, diseases of the peripheral and central nervous
system and several forms of cancer. Production of an infectious
viral particle, and thus the spread of disease, is critically
dependent upon assembly of the herpes virus envelope, a lipid
membrane derived from the infected host cell. Construction of
this biological membrane involves the targeting of a set of
virally-encoded membrane proteins to a particular cytoplasmic
organelle, followed by binding of the viral capsid. Budding of
the capsid through the membrane, followed by a "pinching off"
fusion event generates a sealed, mature envelope with its own
unique subset of membrane proteins. We are dissecting the
molecular machinery used to carry out these targeting, budding
and scission events by a combination of biochemical and
molecular genetic approaches. The processes of viral assembly
and envelope biogenesis are being stu