OLIGONUCLEOTIDES Volume 21, Number 2, 2011 Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. DOI: 10.1089/oli.2011.

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Original Articles

Antisense Oligonucleotides Targeting Abhydrolase Domain Containing 2 Block Human Hepatitis B Virus Propagation
Xiaoran Ding, Jing Yang, and Shengqi Wang

Hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a major health concern worldwide and only a minority of treated patients develop a sustained protective response following a short course of therapy, and most patients require prolonged treatment to suppress viral replication. However, several recent reports showed that inhibition of certain host cell proteins prevented viral infection, specically the human abhydrolase domain containing 2 (ABHD2) has been conrmed by our previous study to be upregulated in HepG2.2.15 cells but downregulated by lamivudine. These observations suggested that ABHD2 was important for HBV propagation and could be a target of novel anti-HBV drugs. To assess the importance of ABHD2 to the HBV infection process, antisense oligonucleotides (ASODNs) were used to downregulate ABHD2 expression in HepG2.2.15 cells. From 5 ASODNS candidates tested, AB3 signicantly downregulated ABHD2 mRNA and protein expression levels. Further, AB3 signicantly reduced HBV DNA, hepatitis B surface antigen, and hepatitis B e antigen protein expression levels in cell medium without affecting cell viability. These results suggest that downregulation of ABHD2 using ASODNs blocked HBV replication and expression without affecting host cell physiology. Further, data demonstrated an essential role of ABHD2 in HBV propagation, suggesting it can serve as a novel target for anti-HBV drug development.

Introduction

epatitis B virus (HBV) infection is a major worldwide public health problem. Globally, >350 million people are infected with HBV, and in some infected individuals the disease develops into liver cirrhosis and hepatocellular carcinoma (Nassal, 2008; Reyes-del Valle et al., 2009). Current HBV antiviral therapies include alpha-interferon or lamivudinebased therapies; however, the long-term efcacy of these treatments is disappointing because of the low seroconversion rates and the development of drug-resistant HBV mutants (Papatheodoridis et al., 2002; Lai et al., 2003; Rapti et al., 2007). The lack of therapeutic options highlight the urgent need for developing more-effective antiviral therapies that can reduce or eliminate viral infections completely with diminished side effects. Human abhydrolase domain containing 2 (ABHD2), an a/b hydrolase protein family member, possesses hydratase catalytic activity (Holmquist, 2000). ABHD family genes were identied during a gene screen of human emphysematous tissues (Edgar and Polak, 2002) and ABHD2 was demonstrated to play a critical role in maintaining lung structural integrity by affecting lung homeostasis ( Jin et al., 2009). It was later demonstrated that ABHD2 was involved in smooth muscle cell migration and in neointimal thick-

ening of vascular smooth muscle cells (Miyata et al., 2005). However, no reports to date have described the relationship between HBV infection and ABHD2. Previous studies from our laboratory demonstrated that ABHD2 expression was upregulated in HepG2.2.15 cells but downregulated by lamivudine (Ding et al., 2008); however, as up- or downregulated genes may play different roles in facilitating viral replication, pathogenesis, or cellular responses associated with viral clearance, it was unclear what role upregulation of ABHD2 might play in the context of controlling viral replication. In this study, antisense oligonucleotides (ASODNs) were used to down-regulate ABHD2 expression as a means of assessing whether ABHD2 was essential to HBV propagation and whether ABHD2 can be used as a target for anti-HBV drugs. Materials and Methods Design and synthesis of ASODN The entire ABHD2 mRNA sequence (GenBank accession number: NM 007011) was chosen as a potential target sequence. The secondary mRNA structure was predicted using the MFOLD Web server (Zuker, 2003). Five regions with structural motifs deemed favorable for ASODN binding were chosen as targets (Patzel et al., 1999). Using a BLAST search,

Beijing Institute of Radiation Medicine, Beijing, Peoples Republic of China.

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78 the ASODNs targeting these regions were determined to be specic and did not appear to inhibit the expression of other proteins (Table 1). All ASODNs were synthesized on an ABI8909 nucleic acid synthesis system and puried by Oligonucleotide Purication Cartridge (OPC) (Perkin-Elmer, Foster City, CA), and ASOD lengths were veried by gel electrophoresis. As ASODs containing phosphorothioate are nuclease resistant (Cohen, 1993; Uhlmann et al., 1999), all ASODNs generated were chemically modied with phosphorothioate by substituting the oxygen molecules of the phosphate backbone with sulfur. Cell culture and transfection HepG2.2.15 cells (clonal cells derived from HepG2 cells transfected with a plasmid containing more than full-length HBV DNA) that secrete hepatitis B virions (Sells et al., 1987, 1988) were kindly provided by the Beijing Medical University and were originally provided by the Mount Sinai Medical Center, New York. HepG2.2.15 cells were cultured in minimal essential medium (Invitrogen, Carlsbad, CA) supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum (Gibco, Grand Island, NY), 380 mg/mL antibiotic G-418 sulfate (Promega, Madison, WI), l-glutamine (2 mm), and amicaxin sulfate (200 U/L). For transient transfection experiments, HepG2.2.15 cells were plated at 1.5105 cells per 35-mm well and grown to 50%70% conuence. Cells were then transfected with ASOs in the presence of lipofectin (1 mg/mL lipofectin and 0.1 mM oligonucleotide; Invitrogen) according to the manufacturers protocol. After cell incubation with respective ASODNs for 6 hours, the media were replaced and cultures were incubated for 72 hours. Cell culture media were collected and examined for the presence of hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg), hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg), and HBV DNA. Total cellular RNA and protein were extracted for determining the level of ABHD2 mRNA and protein. Detection of ABHD2 mRNA by semiquantitative reverse transcriptionpolymerase chain reaction Seventy-two hours posttranscription, total cellular RNA was extracted from HepG2.2.15 cells using TRIzol Reagent (Invitrogen) according to the manufacturers instructions. The quality of the puried RNA was assessed using formaldehyde agarose gels. Reverse transcriptionpolymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) was performed as previously described (Yang et al., 2005). Briey, cDNA templates were synthesized from 1 mg total RNA using SuperScript II reverse transcriptase (Invitrogen) and an oligo(dT) primer. The PCR was performed in a 20 mL reaction volume under the following conditions: 5 minutes at 948C followed by 27 cycles of 948C for

DING, YANG, AND WANG 20 s, 608C for 20 s, and 728C for 20 s, with a nal incubation for 5 minutes at 728C. PCR products were then subjected to electrophoresis on a 2.0% agarose gel, bands visualized by ethidium bromide staining, and respective band intensities measured by scanning the gel with Gel Doc 1000 (Bio-Rad, Hercules, CA). PCR products were quantied by densitometry and normalized with respect to glyceraldehyde 3-phophate dehydrogenase (GAPDH) as an internal control. The forward (fp) and reverse (rp) primers used were ABHD2-fp (50 -GCCCCACCTGACCTCTACT-30 ), ABHD2-rp (50 -AACGA AAGTGCGGATGTATT-30 ), GAPDH-fp (50 -ACCACAGTCC ATGCCATCAC-30 ), and GAPDH-rp (50 -TCCACCACCCT GTTGCTGTA-30 ). Analysis of the ABHD2 by western blot Rabbit anti-human ABHD2 antibodies were prepared by professor Yanning Xue and their specicity was conrmed. To detect cellular expression of ABHD2, HepG2.2.15 cells were trypsinized after transfection and lysed with lysis buffer (0.5% deoxycholic acid sodium salt, 0.1% sodium dodecyl sulfate, 1% Nonidet P-40, and a protease inhibitor cocktail [Roche Molecular Biochemicals, Mannheim, Germany]). Equal amounts (50 mg) of protein were run on a 10% sodium dodecyl sulfate polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and then transferred onto Hybondpolyvinylidene diuoride membranes (Amersham, Arlington Heights, IL). Blots were blocked in Tris-buffered saline (TBS) containing 5.0% nonfat dry milk, washed with TBS 0.2% Tween 20 (TBST), and then probed with rabbit anti-human ABHD2 antibodies or incubated with primary mouse anti-human actin (Pharmacia, Hong Kong, China) in TBS containing 2.5% nonfat dry milk at room temperature for 1 hour. After washing with TBST, blots were probed with a secondary peroxidase-conjugated antibody in TBS containing 2.5% nonfat dry milk at room temperature for 1 hour. Blots were then washed and immunoreactive proteins were visualized on a autoradiogram using ECL Western blot detection reagents (Santa Cruz Biotechnology, Santa Cruz, CA) and exposing blots to X-Omat BT Film (Kodak, Rochester, NY). Bands were quantied by densitometry using an ATTO Densitograph (ATTO Corporation, Tokyo, Japan) normalized against the b-actin internal control. HBV DNA detection in cell culture medium by RT-PCR To assess the effect of ASODNs on HBV DNA levels, HBV DNA concentrations in culture medium were determined by RT-PCR. Posttransfection, cell culture media were incubated at 948C for 15 minutes. After centrifugation at 12,000 g for 10 minutes, supernatants were used as an RT-PCR template as previously described (He et al., 2001; Wang et al., 2002). The

Table 1. Antisense Oligonucleotide Sequences Targeting Abhydrolase Domain Containing 2 mRNA Number 1 2 3 4 5 Code AB1 AB2 AB3 AB4 AB5
ABHD2, abhydrolase domain containing 2.

ABHD2 position (nt) 12021221 11921211 26272646 12071226 17071726

Length (nt) 20 20 20 20 20

Sequence (50 30 ) CGTGCAGCCATAGGTGAACA TAGGTGAACATGCGTGGCGA TAAAATCCCCAGGCTCCTTC TCCCACGTGCAGCCATAGGT TTTCATGCACCAACGGATCG

SUPPRESSION OF HEPATITIS B VIRUS REPLICATION BY ABHD2 forward HBV DNA primer 50 -GGA GTA TGG ATT CGC ACT CCT C-30 and the reverse primer 50 -TTG TTG TTG TAG GGG ACC TGC CT-30 , in addition to the uorescent probe 50 -ACT TCC GGAAAC TAC TGT TAG ACG A-30 and the quenching probe 50 -GTA GTT TCC GGA AGT-30 , were utilized. PCR amplication and analysis were performed using the iCycler real-time PCR detector (Bio-Rad). Assays were repeated in triplicate and the average threshold cycle values were used to determine HBV DNA concentrations. The inhibitory rate was calculated using the follow formula: IR (%) (Ccontrol Ctester)/Ccontrol100%, where Ccontrol represents HBV DNA copies in HepG2.2.15 cells and Ctester represents HBV DNA copies in cells transfected with ASODNs. HBsAg and HBeAg detection assays To assess the effect of ASODNs on HBV protein levels, HBsAg and HBeAg concentrations in culture medium were determined using diagnostic HBsAg and HBeAg enzymelinked immunosorbent assay kits (Sino-American Biotechnology Co., Beijing, China) as described by the manufacturer. The inhibitory rates were calculated according to the following formula: inhibitory rate (%) Acontrol Atest/Acontrol100%. Assays were performed in triplicate and the average inhibitory rate expressed as the mean standard deviation. Cell proliferation and apoptosis assays MTS assays for cell proliferation were performed using the CellTiter 96 Aqueous One solution cell proliferation assay kit (Promega). The assay for apoptosis detection was performed using the Annexin V-FITC kit (Baosai, Beijing, China). Statistical analysis Data are expressed as mean standard deviation. Statistical analyses were performed using the Students t-test (2tailed) and one-way analysis of variance. All data represent at least 2 independent experiments. Results The effect of ASODNs on ABHD2 expression To determine whether ABHD2 affects HBV replication, ASODNs were used to downregulate ABHD2 expression levels in HepG2.2.15 cells. To test the efcacy of respective ASODNs, their effect on ABHD2 mRNA and protein expression levels were rst examined by semiquantitative RTPCR and western blot analyses. HepG2.2.15 cells treated with AB1, AB3, AB4, and AB5 had signicantly downregulated (76.71%, 85.97%, 77.85%, and 50.79%, respectively) ABHD2 mRNA expression levels (Fig. 1AC) and the ABHD2 protein expression levels were signicantly diminished by 93.83% and 92.15%, respectively, following treatment with AB3 and AB5 (Fig. 2A, B). Based on these results, AB3 was selected for use in subsequent experiments designed to examine ASODN effects on protein expression and viral infections. AB3-mediated downregulation of ABHD2 expression is specic and dose dependent To exclude nonspecic effects that may be conferred by AB3, 2 controls, SA3 (50 -GAAGGAGCCTGGGGATTTTA-30 )

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FIG. 1. Expression of abhydrolase domain containing 2 (ABHD2) mRNA in antisense oligonucleotide (ASODN) treated HepG2.2.15 cells. (A) HepG2.2.15 cells were either untreated, treated with lipofectin only, or lipofectin treated in the presence of 0.8 mM ASODNs for 3 days, at which time cells were harvested and ABHD3 mRNA levels were analyzed by reverse transcriptionpolymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and coamplied with glyceraldehyde 3-phophate dehydrogenase (GAPDH) mRNA (C, negative control; M, DNA markers). (B) HepG2.2.15 cells were either untreated, treated with lipofectin only, or lipofectin treated in the presence of 0.8 mM AB3 for 3 days, at which time ells were harvested and ABHD2 mRNA levels were analyzed by RTPCR and coamplied with GAPDH mRNA (C, negative control; LIP, lipofectin; M, DNA markers). (C) Quantication of ABHD2 mRNA inhibition in treated cells. Each ABHD2 PCR product was quantied and normalized against GAPDH levels. Data are expressed as mean standard deviation (SD) from 3 independent experiments, assuming that ABHD2:GAPDH mRNA levels in control cells were 100%.

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FIG. 2. ABHD2 protein expression in ASODN-treated HepG2.2.15 cells. (A) HepG2.2.15 cells were either untreated, treated with lipofectin only, or lipofectin treated in the presence of 0.8 mM ASODNs for 3 days, at which time cells were harvested and ABHD2 expression was analyzed by western blot (C, negative control). (B) ABHD2 protein levels in treated cells compared with control cells. ABHD2 protein levels were normalized to the b-actin protein levels, assuming that the ABHD2:b-actin protein levels in control cells were 100%. Results are expressed as the mean SD of 2 independent experiments. and RA3 (50 -TCCCTCCAGTACACGTCTAA-30 ), were used. SA3 is directed against AB3 and used to determine the effect of phosphorothioate ODNs on cells. RA3 is a scrambled 3 sequence used to test whether the AB3 sequence nonspecically affects cell functions. These results showed that treatment with 0.8 mM SA3 or RA3 did not alter ABHD2 mRNA or protein expression levels compared with cells treated with serial dilutions of AB3, demonstrating a dose-dependent downregulation of ABHD2 mRNA and protein levels (Figs. 35). HBV replication is reduced following treatment with AB3 To detect whether blocking HBV propagation was specic, HepG2.2.15 cells were treated, respectively, with 0.8 mM AB3, SA3, or RA3 and the levels of HBV DNA, HBsAg, and HBeAg secreted into cell media were determined. These results demonstrated that SA3 and RA3 did not affect HBV replication in HepG2.2.15 cells (Fig. 6). AB3 reduced HBV production in HepG2.2.15 cells in a dose-dependent manner To determine whether ABHD2 inhibition could block HBV propagation, HepG2.2.15 cells were treated with serial dilutions of AB3 and HBV DNA, HBsAg, and HBeAg were detected after 3 days (Fig. 7). These data demonstrated that AB3 (0.8 mM) inhibited HBV DNA, HBsAg, and HBeAg secretion

FIG. 3. AB3 specically downregulates ABHD2 mRNA. (A) Semiquantitative RT-PCR analysis of ABHD2 mRNA in HepG2.2.15 cells treated with either 0.8 mM AB3, SA3, or RA3 (C, negative control; M, DNA markers). (B) ABHD2 mRNA levels in treated cells compared with control cells. ABHD2 mRNA levels were normalized to the level of GAPDH mRNA, assuming that the ABHD2:GAPDH mRNA levels in control cellswere 100%. Expression rates were calculated and expressed as the mean SD from 2 independent experiments. into culture supernatants (65.50%, 67.47%, and 53.04% inhibition, respectively) (Fig. 7), suggesting that AB3-mediated inhibition of ABHD2 blocked HBV propagation in a dosedependent manner. Downregulation of ABHD2 does not affect cell viability To examine the viability of HepG2.2.15 cells following AB3 treatment, cell proliferation was assessed using the MTS assay in addition to screening for apoptosis. Treatment of HepG2.2.15 cells with serial AB3 dilutions was not cytotoxic (determined by cellular proliferation rates) even at 6.25-fold higher concentrations of AB3 (5 mM, Fig. 8). Characterization of apoptosis showed that treatment with 5 mM AB3 cells did not induce apoptosis (data not shown), suggesting that HepG2.2.15 cell function was not affected by AB3 treatment over time at various concentrations. Discussion Although specic functions for ABHD2 have not been well dened to date, the characteristic a/b hydrolase fold of the protein family to which ABHD2 belongs sheds light on its

potential function. The a/b hydrolase enzyme family is rapidly becoming one of the largest groups of structurally related enzymes with diverse catalytic functions. Each of these family

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FIG. 6. Hepatitis B virus (HBV) DNA, hepatitis B e antigen (HBeAg), and hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) expression in HepG2.2.15 supernatants following treatment with either AB3, SA3, or RA3. Expression rates were calculated and expressed as the mean SD from 3 independent experiments, assuming that the expression levels of HBV DNA, HBsAg, and HBeAg in control cells were 100% (C, negative control). levels in HepG2.2.15 cells. ASODNs are short, single-strand DNA sequences (1325 nucleotides) thought to hybridize to specic mRNA sequences inducing target RNA degradation by RNase-H and/or by forming a stable DNA-RNA duplex and a special local structure, which might hinder RNase-H cleavage activity that results in blocking protein translation (Dias and Stein, 2002; Scherer and Rossij, 2003; Coma et al., 2004). The data presented in this report showed that downregulation of ABHD2 using AB3 signicantly reduced HBV DNA, HBsAg, and HBeAg levels in HepG2.2.15 cell supernatants, suggesting that AB3-mediated ABHD2 suppression blocked HBV DNA replication and HBV mRNA transcription, stability, or translation and reduced the export of HBeAg and HBsAg. We therefore hypothesized that ABHD2 was essential to HBV replication and that ABHD2 might therefore be a potential target for anti-HBV drug development. In our previous work, the expression of ABHD2 was downregulated by lamivudine (Ding et al., 2008). However, several other reports showed that lamivudine treatment did not reduce

FIG. 8. Downregulation of AHBD2 does not affect cell viability. We assumed that the optical density (OD) value of control cells was 1. The OD ratios are expressed as mean SD from 3 independent experiments.

FIG. 7. Reduction in HBV production by AB3 is dose dependent. HepG2.2.15 cells were treated with AB3 dilutions for 3 days. The inhibitory rates are expressed as the mean SD from 3 independent experiments.

HBV-specic RNAs that completely blocked HBV DNA replication (Doong et al., 1991; Lai and Yuen, 2000). Additional research will be required to identify the reasons for this discrepancy. It is well known that phosphorothioate ASODNs are associated with nonspecic effects caused by the nonspecic cleavage of unintended targets (Woolf et al., 1992). For this reason, the specicity of AB3 was also analyzed by RT-PCR and western blot. These results showed that the levels of bactin protein and GAPDH mRNA were unaffected by AB3 treatment; however, AB3 downregulated ABHD2 expression in a dose-dependent manner. These data suggested that AB3mediated downregulation of ABHD2 did not occur as a consequence of the downregulation of either mRNAs or protein synthesis of housekeeping genes. As phosphorothioate ODNs (SA3) did not affect HBV propagation (nor did a scrambled sequence of AB3) it suggested that the reduction of HBV DNA levels were not the result of nonspecic effects of AB3 on cell function/physiology. Moreover, AB3 did not affect HepG2.2.15 cell proliferation or induce apoptosis even at high doses (5 mM). These results suggested that reductions in HBV DNA levels were not caused by abnormalities to cell function resulting from AB3 treatment. The data presented in this report suggest that AB3 holds the potential of serving as a novel anti-HBV treatment. Current antiviral therapies for HBV include treatment with alpha-interferon or lamivudinebased therapies, but longterm resolution of disease using these approaches has been disappointing because of low seroconversion rates and the development of drug-resistant viral mutants (Papatheodoridis et al., 2002; Lai et al., 2003; Rapti et al., 2007). Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop more-effective antiviral therapies that can reduce or eliminate viral infections completely, with fewer side effects than those already associated with present treatment modalities. The use of ASODNs as antiviral agents has emerged as a powerful new approach for treating HBV infections (Wagner and Flanagan, 1997; Veal et al., 1998) and many ASODN drugs are now being widely developed. For instance, Vitravene (ISIS Pharmaceuticals, Carlsbad, CA) is an antisense drug currently used for the treatment of cytomegalovirus infections, which has been already approved by the Food and Drug Administration (Marwick, 1998; Stix, 1998; Wacheck,

SUPPRESSION OF HEPATITIS B VIRUS REPLICATION BY ABHD2 2006). In this report, reduction of HBV replication by AB3 suggested that AB3 might be developed as a new drug for HBV therapy. In conclusion, we identied ABHD2 as a new HBV infection-related gene, and targeting ABHD2 with ASODNs blocked HBV propagation, denstrating that ABHD2 is essential to HBV replication and that it might therefore serve as a target for anti-HBV drug development. Acknowledgments This work was supported by a grant from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (30901825), a grant from The National Key Technologies R&D Program for New Drugs (2009ZX09301-002 and 2009ZX09503-021), a grant from the National High Technology Research and Development Program (863 Program) of China (2007A A02Z108), and grant from the Important National Science and Technology Specic Projects for Infectious Diseases (2008ZX10002-011). Author Disclosure Statement No competing nancial interests exist. References
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DING, YANG, AND WANG Address correspondence to: Dr. Shengqi Wang Beijing Institute of Radiation Medicine 27 Taiping Road Haidian District Beijing 100850 Peoples Republic of China E-mail: sqwang@nic.bmi.ac.cn Dr. Jing Yang Beijing Institute of Radiation Medicine 27 Taiping Road Haidian District Beijing 100850 Peoples Republic of China E-mail: jingyang0511@yahoo.com.cn Received for publication January 17, 2011; accepted after revision February 24, 2011.

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