Poxvirus Secreted Complement Control Proteins Grant McFadden1,* and Richard Moyer2 1
The John P. Robarts Research Institute and Department of Microbiology and Immunology, The University of Western Ontario, 1400 Western Road, London, Ontario, N6G 2V4, Canada 2 Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, University of Florida College of Medicine, PO Box 100266, Gainesville, FL 32610-0266, USA * corresponding author tel: (519)663-3184, fax: (519)663-3847, e-mail:
[email protected] DOI: 10.1006/rwcy.2000.03011.
SUMMARY Numerous members of the herpesvirus and poxvirus families express secreted proteins related to the superfamily of complement regulators as defined by the presence of multiple short consensus repeats (SCRs) and which act by binding and inhibiting key elements of the classical and alternative complement cascades. In the case of poxviruses, the two most extensively studied members are from vaccinia virus and cowpox virus. The vaccinia version, also called vaccinia control protein (VCP), and the cowpox protein are both secreted from infected cells as 35 kDa glycoproteins that exhibit an