%0 Journal Article %A Roberts, Lisa O. %A Boxall, Angela J. %A Lewis, Louisa J. %A Belsham, Graham J. %A Kass, George E. N. %T Caspases are not involved in the cleavage of translation initiation factor eIF4GI during picornavirus infection %D 2000 %J Journal of General Virology, %V 81 %N 7 %P 1703-1707 %@ 1465-2099 %R https://doi.org/10.1099/0022-1317-81-7-1703 %I Microbiology Society, %X Infection of cells by many picornaviruses results in the rapid inhibition of cellular protein synthesis due to cleavage of the translation initiation factor eIF4G. The poliovirus (PV) 2A and foot-and-mouth disease virus (FMDV) L proteases are each sufficient to mediate this cleavage, but the cleavage mechanism may be indirect, involving an unidentified cellular protease(s). eIF4G is also targetted for cleavage by caspase-3 during apoptosis. Here, it is shown that caspase inhibitors do not inhibit the cleavage of eIF4GI during PV or FMDV infection. Similarly, in transient-expression studies, the cleavage of eIF4GI induced by PV 2A or FMDV L was unaffected by these inhibitors. Furthermore, the cleavage of eIF4GI was observed in PV-infected MCF-7 cells lacking caspase-3. These data, and the fact that induction of apoptosis yields different eIF4GI cleavage fragments, indicate that caspases do not have a major role in the cleavage of eIF4GI during PV or FMDV infection. %U https://www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/journal/jgv/10.1099/0022-1317-81-7-1703