Functional Analysis of the HIV-1 Gene Products vif and vpu

Abstract

Like other members of the lentivirus subfamily, HIV-1 contains several open reading frames (ORFs) in addition to the gag, pol, and env ORFs present in other retroviruses. Considerable effort has been put into the analysis of these extra genes to understand their significance for virus replication. We were focusing in the last few years on the functional analysis of the HIV-1 vif and vpu genes. The vif gene (previously also designated A, Q, P′, ORF-1, or sor), partially overlaps the pol gene (see Fig. 1); its protein product has a relative molecular mass of 23.000 (M_r 23K) and is present in productively infected cells. The vif gene is highly conserved within HIV-1 and analoguous genes have been identified in HIV-2 and other lentiviruses suggesting that the gene function is an important one.