Analysis of the myeloproliferative sarcoma virus genome: limited changes in the prototype lead to altered target cell specificity.

The myeloproliferative sarcoma virus (MPSV) derived from Moloney sarcoma virus (MSV-Mol) is a unique sarcoma virus which causes expansion of the hematopoietic stem cell compartment as well as the erythroid and myeloid cell lineages. MPSV also induces spleen focus formation in adult mice as do Friend and Rauscher viruses. Analysis of the MPSV genome on methyl mercury gels showed that the genome size is 7.0 kilobases, which is larger than the defective genome of any known MSV-Mol isolate. Hybridization analysis with specific cDNA probes showed that MPSV is a modified sarcoma virus with no sequences in the unique region of the defective sarcoma genome related to unique Friend virus sequences. The only viral sequences in the defective genome other than helper virus-related sequences are derived from the Moloney sarcoma virus genome with no new cellular sequences added. There was no evidence for induction of xenotropic virus sequences in MPSV-infected spleens of DBA/2J mice, indicating that spleen focus formation can be obtained by different mechanisms.