tailed bacteriophage attachment and penetration
cell that have cell walls,such as most bacteria, are infected in a manner different from animal cells,which lack cell walls. the most complex penetration mechanisms have been round in viruses that infect bacteria. The bacteriophage T4 which infects E.coli,is a good example.
the structure of bacteriophage T4 was shows in รูป 9.5b. the virion has a head, within which the viral linear doublestranded DNA is folded,and a long,fairly complex tail,at te end of which is a series of tail fibers and tail pins. The T4 virion first attach to E.coli cell by means of the tail fibers(figure 9.10).the end of the fibers interact specifically with polysaccharides that are part of the outer layer of the gram-negative cell envelope(section 3.7)these tail fibers then retract,and the core of the tail makes contact with the cell wall of he bacterium through a series of fine tail pins at the end of the tail. the activity of a lysozyme-like enzyme form a small pore in the pepidoglycan layer.the tail sheath then contracts,and the viral DNA passes into the cytoplasm of the host cell through a hole in the tip of the phage tail,with the majority of the coat protein remaining outside(figure 9.10)
virus restriction and modification by the host
animals can often eliminate invading viruses by immune defense mechanisms before the viral infection becomes widespread or sometimes even before the virus has penetrated target cells. in addition eukaryotes. including animals and plants,passes and antiviral mechanism known as RNA interference (section 7.10). although they lack immune system,both bacteria and Archaea posses an antiviral mechanism similar to RNA inference,known as CRISPR(chapter 8,microbial sidebar). in addition eukaryotes destroy double-stranded viral DNA after it has been injected by using restriction endonucleases (section 11.1 ),enzymes that cleave foreign DNA at specific sites,thus preventing its replication. this phenomenon is called restriction and is part of a general host mechanism to prevent the invasion of foreign nucleic acid. for such a system to be effective,the host must have a mechanisn for protecting its own DNA. this is accomplished by specific modification of its DNA. this is accomplished by specific modification of its DNA at the sites where the restriction enzymes cut (section 11.1).
Restriction enzymes are specific for double-stranded DNA, and thus single-stranded DNA viruses and all RNA viruses are unaffected by restriction systems. Although host restriction systems confer significant protection, some DNA viruses have overcome host restriction by modifying their own DNA so that they are no longer subject to restriction enzyme attack. Two patterns of chemical modification of viral DNA are known:glucosylation and methylation. For (T2,T4, and T6) have their DNA glucosylated to varying degrees, which prevent endonuclease attack. Many other viral DNAs can be modified by methylation. However, whether glucosylateed or methylated, viral DNAs are modified after genomic replication has occurred by modificstion proteins encoded by the virus.
Other viruses, such as the bacteriophages T3 and T7, avoid destruction by host restriction enzymes by encoding proteins that inhibit the host restriction systems. To counter this, some bacteria have multiple restriction and methylation systems that help prevent infection by viruses that can circumvent only one of them. Bacteria also contain other DNA metylases in addition to those that protect them from their own restriction enzymes. Some of these methylases take part in DNA repair or in gene regulation, but others protect the host DNA from foreign endonucleases. This is necessary because some viruses encode restriction systems themselves that are designed to destroy host DNA! It is thus clear that viruses and hosts have responded to each other’s defense mechanisms by continuing to evolve their own mechanisms to better their chances of infection or survival, respectively.
9.7 Production of viral Nucleic acid and protein
Once a host has been infected, new copies of the viral genome must be made and virus-specific proteins must be synthesized in order for the virus to replicate. Typically, the production of at least some viral proteins begins very early after the viral genome has entered the cell. The synthesis of these proteins requires viral mRNA. For certain types of RNA viruses, the genome itself is the mRNA. For most viruses, however, the mRNA must first be transcribed from the DNA or RNA genome and then the genome must be replicated. We consider these important events here.