Determination of the promoter region of an early vaccinia virus gene encoding thymidine kinase.

Nine recombinant vaccinia viruses that contain overlapping segments of the putative promoter region of the vaccinia virus thymidine kinase (TK) gene linked to DNA coding for the prokaryotic enzyme chloramphenicol acetyltransferase (CAT) were constructed. In each case, the RNA start site and 5 bp of DNA downstream were retained. No significant difference in CAT expression occurred as the deletion was extended from 352 to 32 bp before the RNA start site. Deletion of a further 10 bp, however, led to complete cessation of early promoter activity. Primer extension analysis of the 5' ends of the transcripts verified that the natural TK RNA start site was still used when only 32 bp of upstream DNA remained. Loss of early promoter activity was previously found when deletions were extended from 31 to 24 bp before the RNA start site of another vaccinia gene that is expressed constitutively throughout infection (M.A. Cochran, C. Puckett, and B. Moss, 1985, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 82, 19-23). Sequence similarities in the promoter regions of these two genes were noted.