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Virology

Illicit viral DNA

Nature volume 390, pages 235–236 (1997)Cite this article

More than 20 years ago, the late Victor Zhdanov at the Ivanosky Institute of Virology in Moscow published a remarkable paper1 claiming that complementary DNA copies of RNA viruses such as measles and polio occurred in retrovirus-infected cells. The observations raised eyebrows at the time, because promiscuous cDNA synthesis seemed to run counter to everything known about viral replication. But the data were neither confirmed nor refuted, and were soon forgotten.

On page 298of this issue2, Rolf Zinkernagel's group resurrects the issue posed by Zhdanov's results. Klenerman et al.2 show that cDNA fragments of the RNA-replicating lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus (LCMV) form in mice and in murine and hamster cells in culture which express retroviral reverse transcriptase, the enzyme which uses an RNA template to synthesize DNA. The formation of LCMV cDNA is inhibited by azidothymidine (AZT), confirming that reverse transcriptase activity is involved. There is, of course, ample evidence for reverse transcription having occurred in evolution, with the formation of processed DNA or pseudogenes from RNA3. But the LCMV cDNA is a case of a non-retroviral RNA being caught red-handed in the act of seemingly illicit DNA synthesis.

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References

  1. Zhdanov, V. Nature 256, 471–473 (1975).

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  2. Klenerman, P., Hengartner, H. & Zinkernagel, R. M. Nature 390, 298–301 (1997).

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  3. Coffin, J. in Reverse Transcriptase (eds Skalka, A. & Goff, S.) 445-479 (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, NY, 1993).

  4. Southern, P. J. in Fields Virology Vol. 2 (eds Field, B. N., Knipe, D. M. & Howley, P. M.) 1505-1519 (Lippincott-Raven, Philadelphia, 1996).

  5. Lanford, R., Chavez, D., Chisari, F. V. & Sureau, C. J. Virol. 69, 8079–8083 (1997).

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  1. the Chester Beatty Laboratories, Institute of Cancer Research, London, SW3 6JB, UK

    Robin A. Weiss & Paul Kellam

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  1. Robin A. Weiss
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  2. Paul Kellam
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Weiss, R., Kellam, P. Illicit viral DNA. Nature 390, 235–236 (1997). https://doi.org/10.1038/36740

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