Antiviral activity of transiently expressed mitochondrial antiviral signaling adapter, MAVS orthologue from Asian seabass

The innate immune signaling adapter, Mitochondrial antiviral signaling protein (MAVS) coordinates the signals received from two independent RLRs (RIG-1 and MDA5) to induce IFN & interferon stimulatory genes (ISGs). In the present study, we report identification of an orthologue of MAVS from Lates calcarifer (LcMAVS) and its functional role in piscine RLR signaling. The LcMAVS-cDNA was cloned into pcDNA and transfected into SISS cells. LcMAVS was detected to be a 61KDa protein in western blot. Confocal microscopy demonstrated the mitochondrial localization of LcMAVS. In addition, pcDNA-MAVS transfected cells were protected against Nervous Necrosis Virus (NNV) infection as manifested by the delayed appearance of cytopathic effect (CPE) and decreased viral transcript levels. Ectopic expression of LcMAVS resulted in activation of an ISRE-containing promoter (52 folds over control cells) as well as transcriptional expression of IRF-3, IFN-1 and IFN-inducible genes including Mx and ISG15 (p<0.05). These results suggest that LcMAVS is involved in the antiviral immunity as one of the adaptors in fish IFN-activation pathway.