Rare Hardy Virus Shows Researchers The Way to Gene Therapy

Taking cues from a hardy virus, researchers hope to be able to make some of most difficult diseases amenable to treatment.

Researchers at University of Virginia School of Medicine used the powerful Titan Krios electron microscope to see that genes of the virus SIRV2 take what is called A-form to prevent destruction. The A-form was indentified by Rosalind Franklin more than 50 years ago but such a form for DNA was taught to be nonexistent in the real world until recently. Changing form allows viral DNA to survive in conditions as extreme as boiling acid.

"What's interesting and unusual is being able to see how proteins and DNA can be put together in a way that's absolutely stable under the harshest conditions imaginable. We've discovered what appears to be a basic mechanism of resistance - to heat, to desiccation, to ultraviolet radiation. And knowing that, then, we can go in many different directions, including developing ways to package DNA for gene therapy," said Edward H. Egelman.

The virus may serve as a template for scientists to develop packaging material to transport DNA that deep inside the body for treating disease. Gene therapy is promising but in the absence of protecting packaging material, body's protective mechanisms destroy any foreign DNA that enters.

The study has been published in the journal Science.