An HIV Feedback Resistor: Auto-Regulatory Circuit Deactivator and Noise Buffer

Abstract

Animal viruses (e.g., lentiviruses and herpesviruses) use transcriptional positive feedback (i.e., transactivation) to regulate their gene expression. But positive-feedback circuits are inherently unstable when turned off, which presents a particular dilemma for latent viruses that lack transcriptional repressor motifs. Here we show that a dissipative feedback resistor, composed of enzymatic interconversion of the transactivator, converts transactivation circuits into excitable systems that generate transient pulses of expression, which decay to zero. We use HIV-1 as a model system and analyze single-cell expression kinetics to explore whether the HIV-1 transactivator of transcription (Tat) uses a resistor to shut off transactivation. The Tat feedback circuit was found to lack bi-stability and Tat self-cooperativity but exhibited a pulse of activity upon transactivation, all in agreement with the feedback resistor model. Guided by a mathematical model, biochemical and genetic perturbation of the suspected Tat feedback resistor altered the circuit's stability and reduced susceptibility to molecular noise, in agreement with model predictions. We propose that the feedback resistor is a necessary, but possibly not sufficient, condition for turning off noisy transactivation circuits lacking a repressor motif (e.g., HIV-1 Tat). Feedback resistors may be a paradigm for examining other auto-regulatory circuits and may inform upon how viral latency is established, maintained, and broken. Many viruses have the cunning ability to enter a hibernative or off state, termed latency. When in a latent state, the virus is unable to replicate, and its gene expression program is largely shut down. This facility for lying dormant typically ensures lifelong persistence of the virus in the host; it is also a particularly problematic obstacle in the treatment of HIV. For most viruses, the molecular regulation of entry into latency is not completely understood, but it is believed that viral gene expression must be deactivated in some way. In this study, we introduce a new regulatory motif, the feedback resistor, that enables a genetic circuit to shut off without the need for an active repressor molecule. We first show that many animal viruses might encode feedback resistors in their regulatory circuits. Then, by using a combination of mathematical theory and single-cell real-time imaging experiments, we show that a feedback resistor in the HIV Tat transcriptional circuit likely allows the HIV virus to enter into latency. We postulate that feedback resistors may give increased stability and control in the complex noisy signaling environment of the cell.