Mapping of a vaccinia host range sequence by insertion into the viral thymidine kinase gene.

A vaccinia virus mutant deleted of ca. 18 kilobase pairs at the left-hand end of the genome is unable to multiply on many human cell lines. To determine whether all or some of the deleted sequences were responsible for the host range property, the corresponding region from wild-type DNA was cloned in three pieces into a vaccinia transplacement vector containing the thymidine kinase gene on the HindIII J fragment. The next step was to transfer these pieces to the genome of the host range deletion mutant by in vivo homologous recombination around the thymidine kinase locus. Transfer of one 5.2-kilobase-pair EcoRI fragment was found to restore a wild-type phenotype on the host range mutant, thus demonstrating that only a small portion of the 18-kilobase-pair deletion contains the host range function(s). This result also illustrates that the method initially devised for inserting foreign genes into vaccinia virus DNA is useful for studies of the vaccinia genome.