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Epstein-Barr Virus Encoded lncRNAs Control the Viral Lytic Switch

Li, Z.; Liao, Y.; Ding, W.; Maestri, D.; Grote, S. L.; Romero Agosto, G. A.; Murray-Nerger, L. A.; Guo, R.; Zhao, B.; Rouskin, S.; Teng, M.; Gewurz, B. E.

2025-10-30 microbiology
10.1101/2025.10.29.685446 bioRxiv
Show abstract

Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) uses a biphasic lifecycle, switching between latent and lytic phases to persistently infect most adults. Latency is observed in most tumor cells of the 200,000 EBV-associated cancers/year. EBV reactivation is increasingly implicated in autoimmune diseases, including multiple sclerosis. However, mechanisms that regulate EBV reactivation have remained incompletely understood. Here, we leveraged multi-omic approaches to reveal the existence of pro-latency and a pro-lytic viral long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) that counter-regulate the lytic switch. Known reactivation triggers rapidly induced expression of the pro-lytic lncRNA, which encodes an RNA G-quadruplex that mediated its interaction with CTCF. The pro-lytic lncRNA occupies viral origin of lytic replication enhancers and promotes their looping to the immediate early lytic promoter to trigger reactivation. The pro-latency lncRNA duplexes with the pro-lytic RNA to impede its interactions with CTCF. These studies lay a foundation for therapeutic approaches to manipulate the EBV lytic switch.

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