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J Virol. 1979 March; 29(3): 1168-1176

Virus-Like 30S RNA in Mouse Cells

Peter Besmer¹, Udy Olshevsky, David Baltimore¹, David Dolberg² and Hung Fan²

¹ Department of Biology and Center for Cancer Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139
² Tumor Virology Laboratory, The Salk Institute, San Diego, California 92112

ABSTRACT

Uninfected JLS-V9 mouse cells are known to express high levels of viral sequences that hybridize to complementary DNA made by the BrdU-induced virus of JLS-V9 cells. The genome in the BrdU-induced virus has been found to consist mainly of an RNA species that migrates as 30S RNA material during electrophoresis through agarose gels. This virus-like 30S RNA, designated VL30 RNA, apparently represents a new class of endogenous defective retroviruses that are not generally evident because of their defectiveness and lack of biological function. Fingerprint analysis and hybridization studies show that VL30 RNA does not have homology with the standard nondefective murine leukemia viruses. Upon superinfection with a nondefective murine leukemia virus, or upon induction of endogenous virus with BrdU, VL30 RNA is rescued into virions by phenotypic mixing. When VL30 RNA is rescued by BrdU induction, the VL30 RNA is mainly organized as a 50S complex, but when VL30 is rescued by superinfection, VL30 is also found in 70S RNA. Rescued VL30 RNA sequences can be reverse transcribed by the virion-associated DNA polymerase in an endogenous reaction. Many mouse cells express the sequences, whereas heterologous cells such as rat or rabbit cells do not contain them. By using hybridization of a complementary DNA probe to cellular RNA immobilized on paper, no subgenomic RNA related to the VL30 RNA could be found in cells expressing the VL30 sequences. From 20 to 50 copies of these sequences were found to be contained in the mouse genome. VL30 RNA is probably present in most stocks of leukemia and sarcoma viruses made in mouse cells.

Present address: The Hebrew University, Hadassah Medical School, Jerusalem, Israel.

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