Identification of proteins related to proliferation and regulated by Epstein Barr virus encoded latent membrane protein 1 in nasopharyngeal epithelail cells

AIM: To investigate the molecular mechanism of Epstein-Barr virus encoded latent membrane protein 1 regulated cellular proliferation in nasopharyngeal epithelial cells. METHODS: The nasopharyngeal epithelial cells NP69 were infected with RV-pLNSX (the empty vector) and RV-LMP1 retroviruses, respectively. Therefore, the NP69-pLNSX and NP69-LMP1 cell lines were established. Sequentially, cellular proliferation of NP69-pLNSX and NP69-LMP1 cells was compared to draw the cellular growth curve. The experiments of plate clone formation and forming of soft agar colony were conducted. Meanwhile, the differential expression of proteins were identified between NP69-pLNSX and NP69-LMP1 cell lines by proteomic methods, and the expression levels of partial identified proteins were verified. RESULTS: (1) LMP1 was able to accelerate cellular proliferation of nasopharyngeal epithelial cell NP69 (n=3, P<0.05). (2) Twenty two proteins (9 up-and 13 down-regulated) of LMP1 mediated regulation were identified from infected NP69 cell lines, and the differential expression of partial identified proteins was confirmed by Western blotting and fluorescent real-time quantitative RT-PCR. CONCLUSION: LMP1 probably mediates the regulation of vimentin protein and keratin 19 protein expression to promote cellular proliferation in NP69 cells.