In addition to the human papillomavirus (HPV)-induced immortalization of epithelial cells, which usually requires integration of the viral DNA into the host cell genome, steroid hormone-activated nuclear receptors (NRs) are thought to bind to specific DNA sequences within transcriptional regulatory regions on the long control region to either increase or suppress transcription of dependent genes. In this study, our data suggest that the NR coactivator function of HPV E2 proteins might be mediated through physical and functional linteractions with not only NRs but also the NR coactivators GRIP1 (glucocorticoid receptor-interacting protein 1) and Zacl (zinc-finger protein which regulates apoptosis and cell cycle arrest 1), reciprocally regulating their transactivation activities. GRIP1 and Zacl both were able to act synergistically with HPV E2 proteins on the E2-, androgen receptor-, and estrogen receptor-dependent transcriptional activation systems. GRIP1 and Zacl might selectively function with HPV E2 proteins on thyroid receptor- and p53-dependent transcriptional activation, respectively. Hence, the transcriptional function of E2 might be mediated through NRs and NR coactivators to regulate E2-, NR-, and p53-dependent transcriptional activations. (c) 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.