Molecular piracy of chemokine receptors by herpesviruses

Abstract

To succeed as a biological entity, viruses must exploit normal cellular functions and elude the host immune system; they often do so by molecular mimicry. One way that mimicry may occur is when viruses copy and modify host genes. The best studied examples of this are the oncogenes of RNA retroviruses, but a growing number of examples are also known for DNA viruses. So far they all come from just two groups of DNA viruses, the herpesviruses and poxviruses, and the majority of examples are for genes whose products regulate immune responses, such as cytokines, cytokine receptors, and complement control proteins. This review will focus on human and herpesvirus receptors for chemokines, a family of leukocyte chemoattractant and activating factors that are thought to be important mediators of inflammation. Although the biological roles of the viral chemokine receptor homologues are currently unknown, their connection to specific sets of chemokines has suggested a number of possible functions.