Point mutations in the U3 region of the long terminal repeat of moloney murine leukemia virus determine disease specificity of the myeloproliferative sarcoma virus

The myeloproliferative sarcoma virus (MPSV) is made up entirely of sequences derived from the Moloney murine leukemia virus (Mo-MuLV) and the cellular mos oncogene. As other members of the Moloney murine sarcoma virus (Mo-MuSV) family, MPSV transforms fibroblasts in vitro and causes sarcomas in vivo. In addition, however, MPSV also causes an acute myeloproliferative disease in adult mice. The mos oncogene is essential for its transforming capacity, but sequences specific to the long terminal repeat (LTR) U3 region of MPSV account for its expanded target specificity as compared to Mo-MuSV (C. Stocking, R. Kollek, U. Bergholz, and W. Ostertag, Proc. NatL Acad. Sci. USA 82,5746–5750 (1985)). The U3 region of the LTR of MPSV is, however, closely related to that of the Mo-MuLV, and it appeared likely that the difference between MPSV and Mo-MuSV was caused by a divergent evolution of Mo-MuSV LTRs. In this paper, we show that this is not the case. The few nucleotide differences in the LTR between Mo-MuLV and MPSV are crucial for the expanded host range of MPSV. Moreover, Mo-MuLV-related gag sequences retained in MPSV are not essential for the distinctive biological properties of MPSV.