Comparative Transcription Promoter Activity of Different PERV LTR Subtypes in Human, Monkey and Pig cell lines Yi-Deun Jung1, Jae-Won Huh1,2, Dae-Soo Kim3, Hong-Seok Ha1 and Heui-Soo Kim1 1 Division of Biological Sciences, College of Natural Sciences, Pusan National University, Busan 609-735, Republic of Korea 2 National Primate Research Center, KRIBB, Ochang, Chungbuk 363-883, Republic of Korea 3 Korea Bioinformation Center, KRIBB, Daejeon 305-806, Republic of Korea http://www.primate.or.kr Abstract Transcription activity of 11 different long terminal repeat (LTR) subtypes of porcine endogenous retroviruse (PERV) are analyzed using human (HEK293), monkey (Cos7) and pig (PK15) kidney cell lines. They show the varied transcription regulation activity in different cell lines. However, E4 type (H2-2) shows the distinct promoter activity in the human kidney HEK293 cell line. We thus constructed the series of deletion mutants based on the boundary of U3, R and U5 region. Transient transfection assay of 10 deletion mutants show that U3 is crucial region for transcription regulation. By the computational approaches, 7 potential transcription factors are identified in U3 region. MAZR, HIF-1, STAT5A, and GATA-4 seem to be positive factors and c-ETS-1, CDP, and IRF should be acted by negative elements in human cell lines. Introduction Materials & Methods (A)n Cap Viral genomic RNA Viral spliced RNA Proteins Virus Virus (Virus-like particle) 1.Receptor interaction 2. Penetration 4. Reverse Transcription 3. Uncoating 5. Integration 8. RNA transport 7. RNA processing 6.Transcription 9. Translation 10. Virus assembly (Virus –like particles) 11. Budding U3 R U5 gag pol env LTR Solitary LTR Recombination RNA Sample RT-PCR cloning Sequencing & analysis Luciferase assay Deletion mapping Subtype identification gag : coding for matrix and capsid proteins pol : reverse transcriptase and integrase proteins env : product viral envelope and transmembrane structures U5 gag pol env PBS R U3 5’UTR 3’UTR Results & Discussion Identification of actively expressed PERV LTR elements Luciferase reporter gene assay for 10 deletion mutant full full full deletion deletion MAZR C-ETS-1 U3-2 PERV LTR structure TATA IRF HIF-1 STAT5A GATA-4 U3 R U5 606 bp 67 bp 26 bp Transient transfection assay of PERV-LTR in different cell lines HEK293 COS7 PK15 R U5 Reference Patience C, Takeuchi Y, Weiss RA (1997) Infection of human cells by an endogenous retrovirus of pigs. Nat Med 3: 276-282. Scheef G, Fischer N, Krach U, Tonjes RR (2001) The number of a U3 repeat box acting as an enhancer in long terminal repeats of polytropic replication-competent porcine endogenous retroviruses dynamically fluctuates during serial virus passages in human cells. J Virol 75: 6933-6940