Nuclear Entry of Hepatitis B Virus Capsids Involves Disintegration to Protein Dimers followed by Nuclear Reassociation to Capsids
Figure 8
Immune precipitation of light and heavy capsid fractions from Nycodenz gradients after nuclear import of Mat-C.
Phosphoimager scan after SDS PAGE. D: precipitation by DAKO Ab, F: precipitation by FAb3105, m: marker, C: P-Mat-C. 1: fractions 2–5 of P-Mat-C subjected to nuclear transport (1.250–1.304 g/ml), 2: fractions 2–5 from P-Mat-C added to RNase A-treated cells (1.241 to 1.300 g/ml), 3: light fractions of the same gradient (1.141–1.185 g/ml), 4: fractions 3–5, derived from RNase A-treated cells in which nuclear import was blocked by WGA (1.242 to 1.282 g/ml). m: marker, C: core proteins. The scan shows that FAb3105 precipitated core proteins from light and heavy fractions. DAKO Ab, in contrast, precipitated core proteins from heavy fractions in which capsids peaked, but not from heavy or light fraction of RNase A-treated cells.