This proposal is a competing renewal application for continuing support of a training program in the Molecular Biology of Eukaryotic Viruses, established at the University of California, Irvine (UCI) in 1988. The goal of this program is to train Ph.D. graduate students in the fundamental aspects of molecular virology as they relate to the regulation of gene expression, virus structure, virus-host interactions, and pathogenesis. During the past review period (9/02-8/07), eight predoctoral students were supported by this training program. An expansion of interdisciplinary research and training programs in the areas of structural biology/proteomics, virus-host interactions, and viruses requiring BSL-3 containment is proposed for the next five years. The number of faculty mentors for this program has been expanded to 15, representing four academic departments at UCI. Faculty members from these departments, along with those from other departments in the School of Biological Sciences and the School of Medicine, participate in the Graduate Program in Molecular Biology, Genetics, &Biochemistry (MBGB) at UCI, which oversees recruitment, admission, and initial training of predoctoral students. All of the NIH Virology Grant trainees belong to the Virology Track in the MBGB program. This track is comprised of faculty, students, postdoctoral fellows, and laboratory staff who have shared research interests in virology and related disciplines. The Virology training program includes elective courses in viral gene expression, molecular pathogenesis of viral infections, and immunopathogenic mechanisms of disease. The research programs of faculty participants include the study of viral genome replication, viral-specific transcription, RNA processing, viral translation and protein processing, assembly and transport of viral structural proteins, and the structures of virus particles. The virology faculty are also studying virus-host interactions that include alteration of host regulatory molecules, growth control, cell cycle regulation, the mechanisms of integration of viral genomes into host cell DNA, and the subversion of host functions for virus gene expression. The viruses/viral systems being studied include murine leukemia virus, a sheep retrovirus (JSRV), HIV, yeast Ty3, poliovirus, human rhinovirus, coxsackievirus, mouse hepatitis virus, SARS coronavirus, arenaviruses, herpes simplex virus, Epstein-Barr virus, human papillomavirus, vaccinia virus, and a number of RNA-containing plant viruses.
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