Inhibition of reverse transcriptase

[TengLeong Chew]

In article <Pine.SOL.3.91.950520193449.3622C-100000 at corona>,
Patrick O'Neil  <patrick at corona> wrote:
>
>One neat in vitro trick I read about earlier this year (I'll have to find 
>a reference) involved using a retroviral vector to insert a gene encoding 
>an RNAse fused to an HIV packaging signal.  The HIV infected cells 
>treated thus in culture, demonstrated about a 90% reduction in productive 
>virus.  Virions were released but most of them were dead-end...the RNAse 
>was found to properly localize to the forming virions where it began 
>hydrolyzing the HIV RNA genome.  There was no measureable affect on 
>normal, cellular RNAs.  This is nice in that it doesn't rely on hitting 
>an enzymatic activity of the virus, so that the  virus cannot evolve a 
>resistance (short of giving up its RNA genome or completely changing its 
>packaging signal).  The downside is that it requires a sort of infection 
>with another retrovirus, strictly as a vector, and consequent random 
>integration into the host cell genome which can lead to other problems, 
>though very rare.    

	Another similar idea is Flossie-Wong Stahl's (sp?) proposal of
using Ribozyme instead of RNases to cleave the HIV genome.


 - T. L. Chew


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