12 Interaction of Rhinovirus with Its Receptor, ICAM-1

Abstract

The rhinovirus is the single major infectious agent causing acute upper respiratory infections in humans. The rhinovirus has also emerged, following the determination of its atomic structure and identification of its major receptor, as a useful virus with which to study the molecular basis of virus/receptor interaction and the mechanism of virus entry into cells. In this chapter, we review the aspects of the structure and function of both rhinoviruses and the major receptor relevant to virus entry into host cells. We then describe recent studies directed toward defining the molecular basis of the interaction of rhinoviruses with this receptor and discuss how conformational changes in the virion may be involved in virus entry and uncoating.

Rhinoviruses belong to the family Picornaviridae and comprise a group of approximately 100 serologically distinct viruses. Of these viruses, 90% utilize a single common cell-surface receptor (Abraham et al. 1984; Uncapher et al. 1991), the major rhinovirus receptor, which has been identified as ICAM-1, or intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (Greve et al. 1989; Staunton et al. 1989). The remaining 10% of the serotypes bind to a second receptor class, designated the minor receptor. The minor rhinovirus receptor appears to be a protein with an apparent molecular weight of 100 kD whose identity has not yet been determined (Mischak et al. 1988; Hofer et al. 1992). One rhinovirus serotype, HRV87, apparently binds to a third receptor (Uncapher et al. 1991). In addition to rhinoviruses, some coxsackie A viruses also utilize ICAM-1 as a receptor (Lonberg-Holm et...