DNA damage enhances the IN-CA independent infectivity of HIV-1. Cells were infected with D64A (A) or WT (B) viruses in the presence of etoposide or bleomycin from 0–48 h post-infection (hpi). After 48 h, cell extracts were prepared and subjected to the luciferase assay. The fold increase of the activity after each viral infection with or without DNA damaging agents was shown. In experiments using cell lines, representative data from one of repeated experiments was shown. Results are presented as mean ± s.d. of triplicate assays. All cells except for MT-4 cells were treated with 0, 0.625, 1.25, 2.5, 5, 10 μM etoposide or 0, 1.25, 2.5, 5, 10, 20 μM bleomycin. MT-4 cells were treated with 0, 0.039, 0.078, 0.156, 0.313, 0.625 μM etoposide or 0, 0.078, 0.156, 0.313, 0.625, 1.25 μM bleomycin. Raw data of luciferase activity was shown in Additional file 1: Figure S4. *, P < 0.05; **, P < 0.01.