In semen, proteolytic peptide fragments from prostatic acid phosphatase can form amyloid fibrils termed SEVI (semen-derived enhancer of viral infection). These fibrils greatly enhance human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infectivity by increasing the attachment of virions to target cells. Therefore, SEVI may have a significant impact on whether HIV is successfully transmitted during sexual contact. Here, we demonstrate that surfen, a small molecule heparan sulfate proteoglycan antagonist, inhibits both SEVI-and semen-mediated enhancement of HIV type 1 infection. Surfen interferes with the binding of SEVI to both target cells and HIV type 1 virions but does not deaggregate SEVI fibrils. Because SEVI can increase HIV infectivity by several orders of magnitude, supplementing current HIV microbicide candidates with SEVI inhibitors, such as surfen, might greatly increase their potency.
HIV2 is primarily a sexually transmitted disease. Worldwide, estimates suggest that the majority of all HIV infections are acquired through sexual contact. This includes sexual transmission from male to female, from male to male, and from female to male. In all these routes of infection, semen is either the vehicle carrying HIV (in the case of male-to-female and male-to-male transmission) or is often present during the infection process (in the case of female-to-male transmission).Recently, semen has been reported to enhance HIV infection (1). Fractionation of semen from healthy donors led to the identification of a factor that can enhance HIV infection up to 10 5 -fold in cell culture when viral inocula are limiting. This factor, termed SEVI (semen-derived enhancer of viral infection), corresponds to amyloid fibrils composed of internal 34 -40 amino acid proteolytic fragments from prostatic acid phosphatase (PAP), a protein present at a concentration of ϳ1-2 mg/ml in semen (1, 2). The predominant peptide fragment, PAP-(248 -286), has eight basic residues, rendering it very cationic (isoelectric point ϭ 10.21). The positively charged SEVI fibrils bind to both target cells and HIV virions and augment infection by increasing physical contact between these two components (1, 3), much in the same way that synthetic cationic polymers promote retrovirus attachment to target cells (4).Although we demonstrated that the cationic nature of SEVI is important for its pro-attachment effects (3), the surface components of target cells that interact with SEVI remained unknown. We previously observed that anionic polymers, such as heparin sulfate, interfere with the binding of SEVI to target cells (3). This led us to hypothesize that the fibrils may bind target cells by interacting with cell-surface heparan sulfate proteoglycans (HSPG), naturally occurring anionic carbohydrate polymers that are closely related in structure to heparin sulfate.We therefore sought to examine whether antagonists of HSPG might inhibit the viral enhancing activity of SEVI. Bis-2-methyl-4-amino-quinolyl-6-carbamide (surfen), a recently identified small molecule antagonist of H...