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Journal of Virology, October 1999, p. 8112-8119, Vol. 73, No. 10
0022-538X/99/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1999, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
Human T-Cell Leukemia Virus Type 2 Rex Protein
Increases Stability and Promotes Nuclear to Cytoplasmic Transport
of gag/pol and env RNAs
Koichi
Kusuhara,1,
Matthew
Anderson,1
Sherrie M.
Pettiford,1 and
Patrick L.
Green2,*
Department of Microbiology and Immunology,
Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, Nashville, Tennessee
37232-2363,1 and Department of
Veterinary Biosciences and Molecular Virology, Immunology, and
Medical Genetics, Center for Retrovirus Research, and Comprehensive
Cancer Center, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio
43210-10932
Received 13 April 1999/Accepted 6 July 1999
The human T-cell leukemia virus (HTLV) Rex protein is essential for
efficient expression of the viral structural and enzymatic gene
products. In this study, we assessed the role of the HTLV-2 rex gene in viral RNA expression and Gag protein
production. Following transfection of human JM4 T cells with wild-type
and rex mutant full-length proviral constructs, PCR was
used for semiquantitative analysis of specific viral RNA transcripts.
In the presence of Rex, the total amount of steady-state viral RNA was
increased fourfold. Rex significantly up-regulated the level of
incompletely spliced RNAs by increasing RNA stability and was
associated with a twofold down-regulation of the completely spliced
tax/rex RNA. PCR analysis of subcellular RNA fractions,
isolated from transfected cells, indicated that the level of
gag/pol and env cytoplasmic RNAs were increased
7- to 9-fold in the presence of Rex, whereas Gag protein production was
increased 130-fold. These data indicate that HTLV-2 Rex increases the
stability and promotes nucleus-to-cytoplasm transport of the
incompletely spliced viral RNAs, ultimately resulting in increased
structural protein production. Moreover, this model system provides a
sensitive approach to further characterize HTLV gene expression from
full-length proviral clones following transfection of human T cells.
*
Corresponding author. Mailing address: Department of
Veterinary Biosciences, The Ohio State University, 1925 Coffey Rd.,
Columbus, OH 43210-1093. Phone: (614) 688-4899. Fax: (614) 292-6473. E-mail: green.466{at}osu.edu.

Present address: Department of Pediatrics, Faculty of Medicine,
Kyushu University, Higashi-ku, Fukuoka 812-8582,
Japan.
Journal of Virology, October 1999, p. 8112-8119, Vol. 73, No. 10
0022-538X/99/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1999, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
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