Interleukin-1 production and cell-activation response to cytomegalovirus infection of vascular endothelial cells

Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) is a source of major complications in immunosuppressed individuals, and endothelial involvement in HCMV infection is well documented. Traditionally laboratory strains of HCMV have been used in experimental investigations in vitro; however the continuous propagation of these strains in fibroblasts have attenuated the virus making it unsuitable for infecting other cell systems such as endothelial cells. In this study a recent clinical isolate of HCMV was propagated through several passages in endothelial cells and was used to investigate the effect of HCMV infection of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVEC) on IL-1 production and cell proliferation. Infection of HUVEC with the clinical isolate of HCMV (at multiplicity of infection 5:1) suppressed the production of IL-1 alpha (82%) and IL-1 beta (99%) at 5 h post infection; the levels returned to that of the control within 24h post infection. Ultraviolet inactivated (but not heat killed) virus produced similar suppression confirming that a thermolabile viral structural protein or intact virion were responsible for this suppression. Infection of HUVEC with the clinical isolate increased the number of these cells and the rate of their proliferation. An increase of infected HUVEC number under quiescent growth conditions continued as the infection progressed (6-10 days post infection), exhibiting, at 3 days post infection, 5 times the number of uninfected HUVEC (control) which did not tolerate the quiescent culture conditions for more than 4 days. Live virus is responsible for this increase because UV-inactivated virus did not maintain the proliferation of HUVEC. These studies suggest that while infection of HUVEC with a recent clinical isolate of HCMV suppressed the production of IL-1 at early hours after infection, it increased the proliferation of these cells at later stages of infection.