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Journal of Virology, April 2005, p. 4664-4671, Vol. 79, No. 8
0022-538X/05/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/JVI.79.8.4664-4671.2005

Precise Identification of Endogenous Proviruses of NFS/N Mice Participating in Recombination with Moloney Ecotropic Murine Leukemia Virus (MuLV) To Generate Polytropic MuLVs

A. S. M. Alamgir, Nick Owens, Marc Lavignon, Frank Malik, and Leonard H. Evans^*

0Laboratory of Persistent Viral Diseases, Rocky Mountain Laboratories, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Hamilton, Montana 59840

Received 24 August 2004/ Accepted 21 November 2004

Polytropic murine leukemia viruses (MuLVs) are generated by recombination of ecotropic MuLVs with env genes of a family of endogenous proviruses in mice, resulting in viruses with an expanded host range and greater virulence. Inbred mouse strains contain numerous endogenous proviruses that are potential donors of the env gene sequences of polytropic MuLVs; however, the precise identification of those proviruses that participate in recombination has been elusive. Three different structural groups of proviruses in NFS/N mice have been described and different ecotropic MuLVs preferentially recombine with different groups of proviruses. In contrast to other ecotropic MuLVs such as Friend MuLV or Akv that recombine predominantly with a single group of proviruses, Moloney MuLV (M-MuLV) recombines with at least two distinct groups. In this study, we determined that only three endogenous proviruses, two of one group and one of another group, are major participants in recombination with M-MuLV. Furthermore, the distinction between the polytropic MuLVs generated by M-MuLV and other ecotropic MuLVs is the result of recombination with a single endogenous provirus. This provirus exhibits a frameshift mutation in the 3' region of the surface glycoprotein-encoding sequences that is excluded in recombinants with M-MuLV. The sites of recombination between the env genes of M-MuLV and endogenous proviruses were confined to a short region exhibiting maximum homology between the ecotropic and polytropic env sequences and maximum stability of predicted RNA secondary structure. These observations suggest a possible mechanism for the specificity of recombination observed for different ecotropic MuLVs.

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* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Laboratory of Persistent Viral Diseases, Rocky Mountain Laboratories, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, 903 S. 4th St., Hamilton, MT 59840. Phone: (406) 363-9374. Fax: (406) 363-9286. E-mail: levans{at}niaid.nih.gov.

Present address: Bio-Inova Life Sciences International, 78372 Plaisir Cedex, France.

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Journal of Virology, April 2005, p. 4664-4671, Vol. 79, No. 8
0022-538X/05/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/JVI.79.8.4664-4671.2005

This article has been cited by other articles:

• Evans, L. H., Alamgir, A. S. M., Owens, N., Weber, N., Virtaneva, K., Barbian, K., Babar, A., Malik, F., Rosenke, K. (2009). Mobilization of Endogenous Retroviruses in Mice after Infection with an Exogenous Retrovirus. J. Virol. 83: 2429-2435 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Evans, L. H., Lavignon, M., Peterson, K., Hasenkrug, K., Robertson, S., Malik, F., Virtaneva, K. (2006). In vivo interactions of ecotropic and polytropic murine leukemia viruses in mixed retrovirus infections.. J. Virol. 80: 4748-4757 [Abstract] [Full Text]