Biology Department Faculty
Welkin Johnson
Professor & Department Chair
Welkin Johnson
Ph.D.
Contact
Higgins Hall 545B
Telephone: 617-552-4223
Email: welkin.johnson@bc.edu
ORCID 0000-0001-5991-5414
Education
- Ph.D., Tufts University School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences
Research Interests
Retroviruses; Primate lentiviruses (HIV and SIV); Co-evolution of viruses and their hosts.
Department
Research
Work in our laboratory combines traditional, molecular virology with evolutionary genetics, in order to study how viruses adapt to their hosts. Our goal is to understand how virus evolution is influenced by genetic variation both within host populations (polymorphism) and between host species (divergence). Current projects in the laboratory focus on retroviruses, specifically the lentiviruses of humans and their primate relatives (the human and simian immunodeficiency viruses – HIV and SIV). Among other things, we are interested in the interactions between these viruses and host genes that act as genetic barriers to cross-species transmission (also known as restriction factors), and in understanding how viruses adapt to new genetic environments once a species barrier has been breeched. We are also interested in how lentiviruses adapt within individuals, particularly in response to shifting selective pressures imposed by virus-specific polyclonal antibody responses.
Selected Publications
- Henzy JE, Gifford RJ, Kenaley CP, Johnson WE. An Intact Retroviral Gene Conserved in Spiny-Rayed Fishes for over 100 Million Years. 2016. Mol Biol Evol (2017) 34(3): 634-639.
- Diehl WE, Patel N, Halm K, Johnson WE. Tracking interspecies transmission and long-term evolution of an ancient retrovirus using the genomes of modern mammals. eLIFE. 2016 Mar 8; 5. pii: e12704. doi: 10.7554/eLife.12704. PubMed PMID:26952212.
- McCarthy KR, Kirmaier A, Autissier P, Johnson, WE. 2015. Evolutionary and Functional Analysis of Old World Primate TRIM5 Reveals the Ancient Emergence of Primate Lentiviruses and Convergent Evolution Targeting a Conserved Capsid Interface. PLoS Pathogens 11(8):e1005085.
- Johnson WE. Endogenous Retroviruses in the Genomics Era. 2015. Annual Reviews in Virology 2:135-159.
- McCarthy KR, Johnson WE. Plastic proteins and monkey blocks: how lentiviruses evolved to replicate in the presence of primate restriction factors. PLoS Pathog. 2014 Apr 17;10(4):e1004017. doi: 10.1371/journal.ppat.1004017. eCollection 2014 Apr. Review. PubMed PMID: 24743473; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC3990706.
- Krupp, A., McCarthy, K.R., Ooms, M., Letko, M., Morgan, J.S., Simon, V., Johnson, W.E. 2013. Apobec3G Polymorphism as a Selective Barrier to Cross-species Transmission and Emergence of Pathogenic SIV and AIDS in a Primate Host. PLoS Pathogens 9(10):e1003641.
- McCarthy, K.R., Schmidt, A.G., Kirmaier, A., Wyand, A.L., Newman, R.M., Johnson, W.E. 2013. Gain-of-Sensitivity Mutations in a TRIM5-Resistant Primary Isolate of Pathogenic SIV Identify Two Independent Conserved Determinants of TRIM5α Specificity. PLoS Pathogens 9(5): e1003352.
- Johnson, W.E. 2013. Rapid Adversarial Co-evolution of Viruses and Cellular Restriction Factors. Chapter in Intrinsic Immunity (B. Cullen, ed.), Current Topics in Microbiology and Immunology 371, pages 123-151.
- Henzy, J.E. and Johnson, W.E. 2013. Pushing the Endogenous Envelope. Philosophical Trans. Of the Royal Society B. 368(1626):20120506.
- Kirmaier, A., Wu, F., Newman, R.M., Hall, L.R., Morgan, J.S., O’Connor, S., Marx, P.A., Meythaler, M., Goldstein, S., Buckler-White, A., Kaur, A., Hirsch, V., Johnson, W.E. 2010. TRIM5 Suppresses Cross-Species Transmission of a Primate Immunodeficiency Virus and Selects for Emergence of Resistant Variants in the New Species. PLoS Biology 8(8):e1000462.
- Johnson, W.E. Endless Forms Most Viral. 2010. PLoS Genetics 6(11):e1001210.
- Johnson, W.E. 2008. A Proviral Puzzle with a Prosimian Twist. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 105:20051-20052.
- Newman, R.M., Hall, L., Kirmaier, A., Pozzi, L., Pery, E., Farzan, M., O’Neil, S.P., Johnson, W.E. 2008. Evolution of a TRIM5-CypA Splice Isoform in Old World Monkeys. PLoS Pathogens 4(2):e1000003.
- Newman, R.M., Hall, L.R., Connole, M., Chen, G-L, Yuste, E., Diehl, W., Hunter, E., Kaur, A., Miller, G., Johnson, W.E. 2006. Balancing Selection and Functional Polymorphism in Old World Monkey TRIM5α. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 103(50):19134-19139.
- Johnson, W.E. and Coffin, J.M. 1999. Constructing Primate Phylogenies from Endogenous Retrovirus Sequences. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 96(18):10254-60.