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Human Endogenous Retrovirus K (HML-2) in Health and Disease

Authors :
Bei Xue
David J. Kelvin
Leonardo A Sechi
Source :
Frontiers in Microbiology, Frontiers in Microbiology, Vol 11 (2020)
Publication Year :
2020
Publisher :
Frontiers Media S.A., 2020.

Abstract

Human endogenous retroviruses (HERVs) are derived from exogenous retrovirus infections in the evolution of primates and account for about 8% of the human genome. They were considered as silent passengers within our genomes for a long time, however, reactivation of HERVs has been associated with tumors and autoimmune diseases, especially the HERV-K (HML-2) family, the most recent integration groups with the least number of mutations and the most biologically active to encode functional retroviral proteins and produce retrovirus-like particles. Increasing studies are committed to determining the potential role of HERV-K (HML-2) in pathogenicity. Although there is still no evidence for HERV-K (HML-2) as a direct cause of diseases, aberrant expression profiles of the HERV-K (HML-2) transcripts and their regulatory function to their proximal host-genes were identified in different diseases. In this review, we summarized the advances between HERV-K (HML-2) and diseases to provide basis for further studies on the causal relationship between HERV-K (HML-2) and diseases. We recommended more attention to polymorphic integrated HERV-K (HML-2) loci which could be genetic causative factors and be associated with inter-individual differences in tumorigenesis and autoimmune diseases.

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
1664302X
Volume :
11
Database :
OpenAIRE
Journal :
Frontiers in Microbiology
Accession number :
edsair.doi.dedup.....43d8c5f1522eb8983a8e2a3990c950a4