The same genetic locus directs differentiation-linked expression of endogenous retrovirus gp70 on thymocytes and spleen cells in the mouse.
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Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to E Fleissner.
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Thymocytes of AKR mice express two species of gp70, the envelope glycoprotein of murine leukemia virus (MuLV), encoded by the env gene. One is denoted Ec+ gp70 in reference to the type-antigen Ec and association with ecotropic virus. The other, Ec- gp70, resembles gp70 found also on thymocytes of mouse strains that are not overt producers of MuLV, and has no evident relation to ecotropic virus. Expression of Ec- gp70 type, but not of Ec+ gp70 type, is amplified with age on AKR thymocytes. In contrast, viral core polyproteins, encoded by the gag gene and simultaneously amplified with age, appear to be related to ecotropic virus. These observations imply selective amplification of products of env and gag genes from two sorts of provirus, a phenomenon which may be connected to the dual genetic origin of recombinant mink-cell-focus inducing viruses in AKR mice.
Antibodies in human sera from healthy individuals were shown to be reactive with highly purified 70,000-dalton envelope glycoprotein (gp70) of the simian sarcoma virus-simian sarcoma-associated virus (SSV-SSAV) complex in radioimmunoprecipitation assays under certain conditions. The specificity of the reaction was analyzed in absorption tests with normal human serum proteins, assays of viral gp70 antigenicity after exposure to exo- and endoglycosidases or trypsin, and carbohydrate hapten inhibition studies. On the basis of the results obtained in these experiments we have concluded that immune recognition of SSV-SSAV gp70 can be mediated by naturally occurring heterophil antibodies in human sera that are reactive by virtue of binding to the carbohydrate moiety of the viral gp70 molecules. The results are consistent with the idea that the antibodies in question are elicited as a result of exposure to many natural substances possessing widely crossreacting antigens and are not a result of widespread infection of man with replication-competent oncoviruses.
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X-irradiation of BALB/c mice in the second month of life induced a high incidence of generalized lymphatic leukemia of T-cell origin, beginning at 7 months of age. Infectious ecotropic murine leukemia virus (B-tropic predominant over N-tropic) was isolable from all tumor extracts but exhibited a wide titer range among individual leukemias. Detection of infectious xenotropic virus usually required extensive amplification on indicator cells. Dual-tropic (mink cell focus-forming) virus has not been found in the leukemias. Expression of ecotropic virus in tail extracts prepared at 6.5 months of age, although greatly enhanced compared with unirradiated controls, was not found to be prognostic of tumor development in individual mice. We conclude that leukemogenesis does not show a simple dependence on infectious murine leukemia virus expression in these mice.
Murine leukemia viruses isolated from radiation-induced BALB/c leukemias were characterized with respect to viral proteins and RNA. Analysis by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis of the viral structural proteins revealed that for p12, p15, p30, and gp70, three of four electrophoretic variants of each could be detected. There was no correlation found between any of these mobilities and N- or B-tropism of the viruses. Proteins of all xenotropic viral isolates were identical in their gel electrophoretic profiles. The similar phenotypes of multiple viral clones from individual leukemias and of isolates grown in different cells suggest that the polymorphism of ecotropic viruses was generated in vivo rather than during in vitro virus growth. By two-dimensional fingerprinting of RNase T1-resistant oligonucleotides from 70S viral DNA, the previously reported association of N- and B-tropism with two distinct oligonucleotides was confirmed. The presence of two other oligonucleotides was correlated with positive and negative phenotypes of the virus-coded GIX cell surface antigen. The RNAs of two B-tropic isolates with distinctive p15 and p12 phenotypes differed from the RNA of a prototype N-tropic virus by the absence of three oligonucleotides mapping in the 5' portion (gag region) of the prototype RNA. In addition, one small-plaque B-tropic virus displayed extensive changes in the RNA sequences associated with the env region of the prototype.
To examine the protein proximity and subunit organization of type C retroviruses, preparations of AKR murine leukemia virus were treated with bifunctional cross-linking reagents and analyzed by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE). The cross-linked components obtained were characterized by immunoprecipitation with monospecific antisera against purified viral proteins, followed by SDS-PAGE analysis both before and after cleavage of the cross-links. With these procedures, complexes of both viral envelope and core components were identified. The major envelope subunit obtained was a large (apparent molecular weight of 450,000 to 500,000), glycosylated complex, composed of four to six gp70-p15(E) subunits. This complex was detected over a 100-fold range of cross-linker concentration and thus seems to represent a particularly stable viral substructure. The cross-linked complexes of the core proteins consisted of oligomers of p30 dimers, suggesting that the p30 dimer is a basic structural unit of the viral core. When virion preparations, which had previously been disrupted with the nonionic detergent Nonidet P-40, were cross-linked, the envelope complex was still observed, indicating that this structure is stable in the presence of Nonidet P-40. A similar envelope structure was observed for feline leukemia virus, suggesting that such a complex may be a conserved feature of oncornavirus structure.
Comparison of a number of murine leukemia virus clones by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis revealed extensive protein polymorphism among B-tropic, but not N-tropic, isolates from BALB/c mice, particularly in migration of p30 proteins. A type-specific radioimmunoassay for p30 was developed which uniformly discriminated all B-tropic viruses from N-tropic viruses of BALB/c origin. N- and B-tropic viruses of C57BL/6 and AKR Fv-1b/b origin could also be distinguished by this assay.
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The family of glycoproteins called gp70 includes molecules that are the main constituent of murine C-type viral envelopes, and some that are expressed as mendelian constituents of thymocyte plasma membranes in the absence of virions. To investigate further the relation of viral gp70s to plasma- membrane gp70s we compared peptide maps of gp70s derived by immunoprecipitation from cells infected with chosen viruses and from various thymocytes and leukemiacells known to express one or more of three immunogenetically defined gp70 types: Glx-gp70, X-gp70, and O-gp70. Maps of gp70 from cultured cells infected with ecotropic and xenotropic viruses were distinguishable from one another, and in general resembled gp70 maps prepared directly from ecotropic and xenotropic virions respectively. Maps of gp70s immunoprecipitated from thymocytes of five mouse strains and from two A strain T-cell leukemias also fell into two distinguishable and generally corresponding patterns. Thus peptide-mapping substantiates earlier conclusions that viral gp70s and plasma-membrane gp70s inherited independently of virus-production are highly related or identical molecules. The gp70 maps of thymocytes from B6, B6-G(+IX), 129, and A mice formed a group resembling the map from cultured cells infected with xenotropic virus. Thymocytes from AKR mice, and the two A strain leukemias, gave gp70 maps conforming more to the second pattern, that of cultured cells infected with ecotropic virus. This second pattern probably comprises at least two gp70 types, one of which is X-gp70. Our data indicate that the G(IX)-gp70 and O-gp70 sub-species of gp70 expressed in the cell populations we have studied are coded by xenotropic viral genomes, and X-gp70 by ecotropic viral genomes.
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The Gross cell surface antigen (GCSA), associated with expression of endogenous Gross-type murine leukemia virus (G-MuLV) in tissues of mice, is defined by the cytotoxic reaction of a C57BL/6 antiserum, anti-AKR spontaneous leukemia K36, with cells of the Gross virus-induced C57BL/6 leukemia, Emale symbolG2. Sequential lactoperoxidase-catalyzed radioiodination of Emale symbolG2 cells, Nonidet P-40 lysis, precipitation with anti-K36 serum, and sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis identified molecules with properties of polyproteins encoded by the gag region of the viral genome. These cell surface species could also be labeled by in vitro culturing of Emale symbolG2 with radioactive glucosamine. The viral specificity of these molecules and their participation in the GCSA typing system were established as follows. (i) Absorption of anti-K36 serum with GCSA(+), but not GCSA(-), leukemias led to a marked decrease in precipitation of these proteins. (ii) The same Emale symbolG2 cell surface proteins were also precipitated by antisera against the MuLV virion proteins p30 and p15. (iii) Anti-K36 was shown to possess antibodies against Gross virus p30 and p15. (iv) "Clearing" the Emale symbolG2 lysate of molecules reactive with anti-p30 or anti-p15 sera removed molecules reactive with anti-K36 serum. (v) Absorption of anti-K36 serum with disrupted G-MuLV virions or with Gross p30 or p15 removed GCSA cytotoxic antibodies; partial absorption was achieved with disrupted Rauscher-MuLV (R-MuLV) or with R-MuLV p30, and no absorption was found with R-MuLV p15. These data show that Emale symbolG2 cells express, on their surfaces, MuLV core polyproteins that apparently can be glycosylated and on which the determinants of GCSA are located.
Two species of glycosylated type C viral core polyprotein were identified on the surface of AKR spontaneous leukemia cells. One of these cell surface polyproteins was shown by immunoprecipitation to have antigenic determinants of murine leukemia virus p30, p15, p12, and p10; the other had murine leukemia virus p30, p15, and p12, but not p10, determinants. Both species were also expressed on thymocytes from 6-month-old, preleukemic AKR mice.
Cloned stocks of several murine leukemia viruses (MuLVs) were shown to be leukemogenic for susceptible mice after more than nine years of in vitro passaging in mouse embryo fibroblasts. Tissue culture-grown Rauscher (R-) MuLVs injected into newborn or young adult BALB/c mice induced lymphocytic leukemias in 100% of the animals beginning 80 days post-inoculation. No erythroblastic leukemia was observed even after passaging the tissue-culture-grown R-MuLVs twice through mice, indicating that the component responsible for that disease had been lost or attenuated during growth in fibroblasts. The tissue-culture-grown stock of Moloney (M-) MuLVs likewise induced lymphocytic leukemias in 94% of injected newborn BALB/c mice, and the tissue culture-grown Gross (G-) MuLVs induced lymphocytic leukemias in 42% of injected newborn C3Hf mice. The host range and neutralization characteristics of viruses recovered from animals that became leukemic after injection with the tissue-culture-maintained MuLVs were found to be identical with those of the injected viruses. These data implicate the injected MuLVs in the induction of the leukemias and suggest that the capacity to induce the disease is stably inherited as part of the viral genome even in the absence of expression.
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