Bacterial expression and cellular localization of Helicoverpa armigera nucleopolyhedrovirus Orf33 in infected host cells.

Helicoverpa armigera single nucleocapsid nucleopolyhedrovirus (HearSNPV) is a selective, highly infectious pathogen to H. armigera and has been extensively used for the control of this pest. This study presents the bacterial expression and localization of ha33 in infected host cells. The ha33 protein expressed in Escherichia coli had protein size of 17kDa. Western blot analysis using polyclonal antibody showed that the product of ha33 in infected Helicoverpa zea cells (HzAM1) was a 31kDa protein, larger than the theoretically predicted size of 28.4kDa. The confocal laser scanning microscope observation demonstrated that ha33 gene product was localized in the cytoplasm of infected HzAM1 cells beginning at 6 h p. i. and remained throughout the infection.