Molecular properties of a gag- pol- env+ murine leukemia virus from cultured AKR lymphoma cells.

We have described the isolation of a replication-defective murine leukemia virus from a culture of AKR lymphoma cells [Rein et al., Nature (London) 282:753-754, 1979]. To facilitate the characterization of this murine leukemia virus, we transmitted it to mink cells and analyzed its genome by restriction mapping of the mink cellular DNA. This genome resembled the Akv genome quite closely, but it had an additional KpnI cleavage site at 1.3 kilobase pairs from the 5' end of the provirus and a small (approximately 50-base-pair) deletion between 1.8 and 3.0 kilobase pairs from the 5' end. When we tested these mink cells by immune precipitation or by competition radioimmunoassay, we found that they synthesized gPr82env, but contained no detectable gag or pol proteins. It seems likely that the KpnI cleavage site at 1.3 kilobase pairs reflects an abnormal sequence at or near the beginning of the gag gene, which prevents gag or pol translation by introducing a frameshift or termination codon into this region.