Adeno-associated virus virions with variant capsid and methods of use thereof

An isolated nucleic acid comprising a nucleotide sequence that encodes a variant adeno-associated virus (AAV) capsid protein, wherein the variant AAV capsid protein comprises a peptide insertion relative to a corresponding parental AAV capsid protein, wherein the peptide insertion comprises the amino acid sequence LGETTRP (SEQ ID NO:13), wherein the insertion site is located between two adjacent amino acids at a position between amino acids corresponding to amino acids 570 and 611 of VP1 of AAV2 or the corresponding position in the capsid protein of another AAV serotype, and wherein the variant capsid protein, when present in an AAV virion, provides for increased infectivity of the AAV virion of a retinal cell, wherein the retinal cell is a photoreceptor, a retinal ganglion cell, a Müller cell, a bipolar cell, an amacrine cell, a horizontal cell, or a retinal pigmented epithelium cell.

A variant adeno-associated virus (AAV) capsid protein, wherein the variant AAV capsid protein comprises a peptide insertion relative to a corresponding parental AAV capsid protein, wherein the peptide insertion comprises the amino acid sequence LGETTRP (SEQ ID NO:13), wherein the insertion site is located between two adjacent amino acids at a position between amino acids corresponding to amino acids 570 and 611 of VP1 of AAV2 or the corresponding position in the capsid protein of another AAV serotype, and wherein the variant capsid protein, when present in an AAV virion, confers increased infectivity of a retinal cell compared to the infectivity of the retinal cell by an AAV virion comprising the corresponding parental AAV capsid protein, wherein the retinal cell is a photoreceptor, a retinal ganglion cell, a Muller cell, a bipolar cell, an amacrine cell, a horizontal cell, or a retinal pigmented epithelium cell.