The presence ofherpesvirus saimiri genomes in virus-transformed cells

Abstract

Herpesvirus saimiri (H. saimiri) -transformed cells contain both types of viral DNA, unique L-DNA and highly repetitive H-DNA. DNA from spleen and lymph-node autopsies of two tumor-bearing marmoset monkeys contained 0.14–0.75 / viral L-DNA and 0.115–1.08 / H-DNA. This amount of H-DNA would be equivalent to the presence of 14–130 M-genomes per diploid tumor tissue cell. Six virus-transformed lymphoid cell lines, two of them virus-producing, contained 0.69–2.27 / H-DNA and more than 0.72–1.95 / L-DNA. These concentrations of H-DNA sequences correspond to 83–274 M-genome copies per lymphoid tissue culture cell. The majority of viral genomes in transformed non-producer lymphoid cell lines appeared to be defective, since part of the L-sequences present in virions were found to be deleted in the genome copies of transformed cells. There was a relative excess of repetitive H-sequences in all transformed cells in regard to the ratio of H-DNA/L-DNA in M-genomes of H. saimiri virions.