Recognition of 5′-triphosphate by RIG-I helicase requires short blunt double-stranded RNA as contained in panhandle of negative strand virus

摘要

Antiviral immunity is triggered by immunorecognition of viral nucleic acids. The cytosolic helicase RIG-I is a key sensor of viral infections and is activated by RNA containing a triphosphate at the 5′end. The exact structure of RNA activating RIG-I remains controversial. Here we established a chemical approach for 5′triphosphate oligoribonucleotide synthesis and found that synthetic single-stranded 5′triphosphate oligoribonucleotides were unable to bind and activate RIG-I. Conversely, the addition of the synthetic complementary strand resulted in optimal binding and activation of RIG-I. Short double strand conformation with base pairing of the nucleoside carrying the 5′triphosphate was required. RIG-I activation was impaired by a 3′overhang at the 5′triphosphate end. These results define the structure of RNA for full RIG-I activation and explain how RIG-I detects negative strand RNA viruses which lack long double-stranded RNA but do contain panhandle blunt short double-stranded 5′triphosphate RNA in their single-stranded genome.