The role of baculovirus apoptotic suppressors in AcMNPV-mediated translation arrest in Ld652Y cells

Infecting the insect cell line IPLB-Ld652Y with the baculovirus Autographa californica multinucleocapsid nucleopolyhedrovirus (AcMNPV) results in global translation arrest, which correlates with the presence of the AcMNPV apoptotic suppressor, p35. In this study, we investigated the role of apoptotic suppression on AcMNPV-induced translation arrest. Infecting cells with AcMNPV bearing nonfunctional mutant p35 did not result in global translation arrest. In contrast, global translation arrest was observed in cells infected with AcMNPV in which p35 was replaced with Opiap, Cpiap, or p49, baculovirus apoptotic suppressors that block apoptosis by different mechanisms than p35. These results indicated that suppressing apoptosis triggered translation arrest in AcMNPV-infected Ld652Y cells. Experiments using the DNA synthesis inhibitor aphidicolin and temperature shift experiments, using the AcMNPV replication mutants ts8 and ts8Δp35, indicated that translation arrest initiated during the early phase of infection, but events during the late phase were required for global translation arrest. Peptide caspase inhibitors could not substitute for baculovirus apoptotic suppressors to induce translation arrest in Ld652Y cells infected with a p35-null virus. However, if the p35-null-AcMNPV also carried hrf-1, a novel baculovirus host range gene, progeny virus was produced and treatment with peptide caspase inhibitors enhanced translation of a late viral gene transcript. Together, these results indicate that translation arrest in AcMNPV-infected Ld652Y cells is due to the anti-apoptotic function of p35, but suggests that rather than simply preventing caspase activation, its activity enhances signaling to a separate translation arrest pathway, possibly by stimulating the late stages of the baculovirus infection cycle.