RT Journal
A1 Dewannieux, Marie
A1 Harper, Francis
A1 Richaud, Aurélien
A1 Letzelter, Claire
A1 Ribet, David
A1 Pierron, Gérard
A1 Heidmann, Thierry
T1 Identification of an infectious progenitor for the multiple-copy HERV-K human endogenous retroelements
JF Genome Research 
JO Genome Research 
YR 2006 
FD December 01 
VO 16 
IS 12 
SP gr.5565706 
OP gr.5565706 
DO 10.1101/gr.5565706 
UL http://genome.cshlp.org/content/early/2006/10/31/gr.5565706.abstract 
AB Human Endogenous Retroviruses are expected to be the remnants of ancestral infections of primates by active retroviruses that have thereafter been transmitted in a Mendelian fashion. Here, we derived in silico the sequence of the putative ancestral “progenitor” element of one of the most recently amplified family—the HERV-K family—and constructed it. This element, Phoenix, produces viral particles that disclose all of the structural and functional properties of a bona-fide retrovirus, can infect mammalian, including human, cells, and integrate with the exact signature of the presently found endogenous HERV-K progeny. We also show that this element amplifies via an extracellular pathway involving reinfection, at variance with the non-LTR-retrotransposons (LINEs SINEs) or LTR-retrotransposons, thus recapitulating ex vivo the molecular events responsible for its dissemination in the host genomes. We also show that in vitro recombinations among present-day human HERV-K loci can similarly generate functional HERV-K elements, indicating that human cells still have the potential to produce infectious retroviruses.