PERSISTENT MEASLES-VIRUS INFECTION OF MURINE NEUROBLASTOMA-CELLS DIFFERENTIALLY AFFECTS THE EXPRESSION OF PKC INDIVIDUAL ISOENZYMES

Measles virus (MV) is among the infectious agents displaying a propens ity for establishing persistent infections of the CNS. It is assumed t hat continuous presence of MV defective particles or viral genome in p ersistently infected cells may influence host cellular processes and p erturb biochemical signal transduction pathways operating in linkage t o various cell surface receptors. PKC expression in a MV persistently infected neuroblastoma cell line (NS20Y/MS) was investigated. The rela tive levels of PKC isoenzymes were determined by Western blot analysis . We found that protein levels of PKC alpha, epsilon and zeta, but not PKC delta, were increased in NS20Y/ MS cells. PKC beta, gamma and eta were undetectable. Treatment of NS20Y/MS cells with anti-MV Abs, whic h downregulated MV protein synthesis, also reduced PKC alpha expressio n to the basal level observed in the uninfected NS20Y cells. Our resul ts suggest that a persistent MV infection has specific effects on the expression of certain PKC isoenzymes, We postulate that the MV-associa ted neurologic changes may reflect virus induced changes in biochemica l signaling pathways and that these effects are likely to be regulated by the host's anti-viral humoral immune response.