Fig. 1: The life cycle of retroviruses.
From: The expression, regulation, and function of human endogenous retroviruses in genitourinary cancers
Retroviral infection is a complex and multistep process that involves several distinct stages. Initially, the retrovirus attaches to the cell surface receptor and delivers its viral core to the cytoplasm (steps 1 and 2). Upon entry into the target cell, the viral RNA undergoes reverse transcription, which generates double-stranded DNA that can integrate into the host genome as a provirus (steps 3 and 4). Following integration, various proviruses are transcribed according to their distinct transcriptional start sites, and the resulting transcripts are translated and assembled in the cytoplasm (steps 5, 6 and 7). Finally, the assembled viral particles are bound to the cell membrane and released (steps 8 and 9). (Created with BioRender.com).
