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. 2022 Feb 12;3:100021. doi: 10.1016/j.crviro.2022.100021

Fig. 5.

Fig. 5

Identification of the NSP1 protein functional domain. Truncation of NSP1 limits VSV-EGFP virus replication. (A) Schematic diagram depicting the full length of NSP1 and truncated NSP1 1/3 and NSP1 2/3 in amino acid. The SARS-CoV-2 NSP1 was truncated by high fidelity PCR (GoTaq) and subcloned into a pCDNA3.1/V5–HIS-TOPO plasmid (HindIII and EcoRV insertion sites) which was transfected into A549 ​cells to generate stably expressing cell lines. Expression were confirmed by total RNA extraction (polymerase chain reaction; PCR) and total protein extraction (Western blot). (B) Representative pictures of confocal microscopy imaging with maximum projections of z-stacks for each channel demonstrating the subcellular localization of expressed full length of NSP1, NSP1 1/3 and NSP1 2/3 (anti-V5 antibody; 488 ​nm) in stably expressing A549 ​cells. Analysis of VSV-EGFP (moi ​= ​0.4) virus replication in (C) NSP1, NSP1 1/3 and NSP1 2/3 stably expressing A549 ​cells lines compared to control transfected (pCDNA3.1/V5–HIS-TOPO) or negative (A549 ​cells) based on fluorescence (EGFP; excitation 490 ​nm). Representative overlapping FACS histogram demonstrating the expression of (D) TLR2 (E) TLR3, (F) TLR4 and (G) TLR9 as gated on live (7AAD-) NSP1, NSP1 1/3 and NSP1 2/3 stably expressing A549 ​cells to analyze (H) the number of cells expressing TLR2, TLR3, TLR4 and TLR9 compared to negative control (A549 ​cells). Analysis of VSV-EGFP (moi ​= ​0.4) virus replication in NSP1, NSP1 1/3 and NSP1 2/3 stably expressing A549 ​cells lines compared to control transfected (pCDNA3.1/V5–HIS-TOPO) or negative (A549 ​cells) based on fluorescence (EGFP; excitation 490 ​nm) pre-stimulated (2 ​h) with (I) TLR3 ligand POLY; IC (0.005, 0.05, 0.5 and 5 ​μg/mL), (J) TLR9 ligand CpG ODN 2007 (0.005, 0.05, 0.5 and 5 ​μg/mL), (K) TLR4 ligand LPS (0.01, 0.1, 1.0, 10 and 50 ​μg/mL) and (L) TLR2 ligand PAM3CSK4 (0.005, 0.05, 0.5 and 5 ​μg/mL) and prior to infection with VSV-EGFP. The mean fluorescence unit in uninfected cells was used as the normalization factor for VSV-EGFP readout in infected A549 ​cells.Non-parametric Wilcoxon tests (Mann-Whitney) and one-way ANOVA was used to assess normal distribution and test significance with the results shown as mean ​± ​SD. ∗ (p ​≤ ​0.05), ​∗∗ (p ​≤ ​0.01), ∗∗∗ (p ​≤ ​0.005) and ∗∗∗∗ (p ​≤ ​0.001) indicates a statistically significant difference. All viral infection experiments were performed in 10 technical replicates, and the data are representative of results from 3 independent experiments.