Acta Veterinaria et Zootechnica Sinica ›› 2023, Vol. 54 ›› Issue (6): 2241-2251.doi: 10.11843/j.issn.0366-6964.2023.06.004

• REVIEW • Previous Articles     Next Articles

The Evasion Strategy against CTL Recognition by Herpesviruses of Domestic Animals: Interference with MHC Class Ⅰ Antigen Presentation Pathway

FENG Weimin1, LIU Xiao1, HUANG Teng1,2,3*   

  1. 1. College of Animal Science and Technology, Guangxi University, Nanning 530004, China;
    2. Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region Engineering Research Center of Veterinary Biologics, Nanning 530004, China;
    3. Guangxi Key Laboratory of Animal Breeding, Disease Control and Prevention, Nanning 530004, China
  • Received:2022-11-10 Online:2023-06-23 Published:2023-06-16

Abstract: Persistent infections with herpesviruses are detrimental to the health of farm animals and cause impairment of animal husbandry performance. Due to their robust capability of immune evasion, herpesviruses can effectively antagonize the recognition and consequent elimination by the immune systems of livestock hosts. During the process of replication, herpesviruses take advantage of the host cellular machineries to produce various types of molecules that disrupt the MHC-Ⅰ (major histocompatibility complex class Ⅰ) -mediated antigen presentation pathway, thereby evading the viral clearance by cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CTLs). For herpesviruses, one of the most active research focuses has centered on elucidating the molecular mechanisms by which viral proteins manipulate to induce reduction of MHC-Ⅰ expression. This review summarizes the research advances that have been made over the past decade concerning the modulation of MHC-Ⅰ molecules caused by infection with herpesviruses in livestock. Mechanistically, the involvements of viral proteins were illustrated based on the stages of MHC-Ⅰ antigen presentation. In addition, the domains and functions of the viral homologues were analyzed. By highlighting the current issues and future trends in this field, our perspectives shed novel insights into the therapeutic treatments as well as the development and optimization of vaccines for protecting domestic animals from herpesvirus infections.

Key words: livestock, herpesviruses, MHC class Ⅰ downregulation, molecular mechanisms

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