The nucleotide sequence of the gene for protein IVa2 and of the 5' leader segment of the major late mRNAs of adenovirus type 5.

We present here the primary structure of the region of human adenovirus 5 (Ad5) DNA from nucleotide 4001 through the HindIII site at nucleotide 6246 (map positions 0.11 to 0.17). The corresponding region in the closely related adenovirus type 2 (Ad2) encodes the spliced mRNA for viral protein IVa2 (Chow et al., 1979; Persson et al., 1979). Reverse transcription of the Ad5 pIVa2 mRNA localized the 5' terminus of the mRNA to approximately position 5840, and its splice coordinates to positions 5706 and 5427. From the data of Aleström et al. (1980) for Ad2, the 3' end of this mRNA was inferred to be specified by Ad5 nucleotide 4060. The nucleic acid data allow us to predict an Mr of 50873 for the IVa2 protein of Ad5, which is close to the experimentally determined value of 50000 (Persson et al., 1979). The DNA sequence described here also includes the information for the 5'-terminal leader segment of the major late mRNAs of Ad5.