Inhibition of HIV-1 infection of primary CD4+ T-cells by gene editing of CCR5 using adenovirus-delivered CRISPR/Cas9

J Gen Virol. 2015 Aug;96(8):2381-2393. doi: 10.1099/vir.0.000139. Epub 2015 Apr 8.

Abstract

CCR5 serves as an essential coreceptor for human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1) entry, and individuals with a CCR5(Δ32) variant appear to be healthy, making CCR5 an attractive target for control of HIV-1 infection. The CRISPR/Cas9, which functions as a naturally existing adaptive immune system in prokaryotes, has been recently harnessed as a novel nuclease system for genome editing in mammalian cells. Although CRISPR/Cas9 can be readily delivered into cell lines, due to the large size of the Cas9 protein, efficient delivery of CCR5-targeting CRISPR/Cas9 components into primary cells, including CD4(+) T-cells, the primary target for HIV-1 infection in vivo, remains a challenge. In the current study, following design of a panel of top-ranked single-guided RNAs (sgRNAs) targeting the ORF of CCR5, we demonstrate that CRISPR/Cas9 can efficiently mediate the editing of the CCR5 locus in cell lines, resulting in the knockout of CCR5 expression on the cell surface. Next-generation sequencing revealed that various mutations were introduced around the predicted cleavage site of CCR5. For each of the three most effective sgRNAs that we analysed, no significant off-target effects were detected at the 15 top-scoring potential sites. More importantly, by constructing chimeric Ad5F35 adenoviruses carrying CRISPR/Cas9 components, we efficiently transduced primary CD4(+) T-lymphocytes and disrupted CCR5 expression, and the positively transduced cells were conferred with HIV-1 resistance. To our knowledge, this is the first study establishing HIV-1 resistance in primary CD4(+) T-cells utilizing adenovirus-delivered CRISPR/Cas9.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Adenoviridae / genetics*
  • Adenoviridae / metabolism
  • Animals
  • CD4-Positive T-Lymphocytes / immunology
  • CD4-Positive T-Lymphocytes / virology*
  • CRISPR-Cas Systems*
  • Cell Line
  • Genetic Vectors / genetics*
  • Genetic Vectors / metabolism
  • HIV Infections / genetics*
  • HIV Infections / metabolism
  • HIV Infections / virology
  • HIV-1 / genetics
  • HIV-1 / physiology*
  • High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing
  • Humans
  • Receptors, CCR5 / genetics*
  • Receptors, CCR5 / metabolism

Substances

  • CCR5 protein, human
  • Receptors, CCR5