Penn researchers discover new mechanism for viral replication

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have identified a new strategy that Kaposi’s Sarcoma Associated Herpesvirus (KSHV) uses to dupe infected cells into replicating its viral genome. This allows the virus to remain virtually undetected by the body’s immune system. Previous work suggested KSHV needed viral proteins to initiate replication, but this is the first study to directly show that a section of viral DNA can independently draw upon proteins within a host cell to promote its own replication. The study was published in the August issue of Cell Host and Microbe.