DNA virus infections shape transposable element activity in vitro and in vivo

DUX4 is known to be crucial for TEs induction during zygotic genome activation in early embryonic development. In adults, DUX4 is usually silenced and we previously showed that DUX4 expression is induced by infection with various DNA viruses. We demonstrate binding of DUX4 to TEs upon herpesviral infection and analysis of genes adjacent to TEs shows pathways that are known to be crucial for tumor development. Overexpression of DUX4 significantly induced TEs expression, while its knockout (KO) diminished TEs expression upon HSV-1 infection, underscoring the essential role of DUX4 in TEs activation. Overall design: RNA-sequencing was performed from DUX4 inducible 293T cells with and without dox treatment.