A new archaeal virus that suppresses the transcription of host immunity genes

Abstract

In some extreme environments, archaeal cells have been shown to have chronic viral infections, and such infections are well-tolerated by the hosts and may potentially protect against more lethal infections by lytic viruses. We have discovered that a natural Haloferax strain (48N), which is closely related to the model organism Haloferax volcanii, is chronically infected by a lemon-shaped virus, which we could purify from the medium. The chronic infection by this virus, which we named LSV-48N, is never cleared, despite the multiple defense systems of the host that include CRISPR-Cas, and two CBASS systems. Curing 48N of its virus by genetic engineering, led to radical changes in the gene expression profile of 48N and a dramatic improvement in its growth rate. Remarkably, the cured 48N is the fastest-growing haloarchaeon reported to date, with a generation time of approximately 1 hour at 45C compared to the typical 2.5 hours of H. volcanii or its infected isogen, and faster than any known haloarchaeon. The virus subverts host defenses by reducing their transcription and interfering with the CRISPR spacer acquisition machinery. Our results suggest that the slow growth of many halophilic archaea could be due to the effects of proviruses within their genomes that consume resources and alter the gene expression of their hosts.