Human influenza A viruses are proteolytically activated and do not induce apoptosis in CACO-2 cells.

Replication of human influenza A/H3N2 and A/H1N1 viruses was studied in human CACO-2 cells, a continuous line of intestinal epithelial differentiated cells. Hemagglutinin (HA) was cleaved in these cells by an endogenous protease. Thus, infectious virus was produced that underwent multiple cycle replication and plaque formation in the absence of trypsin added to the media. Cleavage of de novo-synthesized HA occurred at a late stage of the exocytic pathway as indicated by pulse-chase labeling and by experiments employing endoglycosidase H and brefeldin A treatment. However, surface-labeling experiments employing biotinylation suggested that there is no cleavage at the plasma membrane. Unlike HA of serotypes H5 and H7 cleaved at multibasic cleavage sites by furin, the HAs with monobasic cleavage sites analyzed here were not cleaved in CACO-2 cells in the presence of aprotinin, a natural inhibitor of trypsinlike proteases. Growing CACO-2 cells were able to cleave HA of incoming virus, although influenza virus activating protease was not detected in culture medium. These observations indicate that the activating enzyme of CACO-2 cells is a trypsinlike protease functioning in the trans-Golgi network and presumably endosomes. In support of this concept immune staining with antibodies specific to human and bovine trypsin revealed the presence of a trypsinlike protease in CACO-2 cells. Unlike MDCK and CV-1 cells undergoing rapid apoptosis after influenza virus infection, CACO-2 cells showed no apoptosis but displayed cytopathic effects with necrotic signs significantly later after infection. It follows from these data that, depending on the cell type, influenza virus may kill cells either by apoptosis or by necrosis.