Immunoselection of mutants deficient in cell surface glycoproteins encoded by murine erythroleukemia viruses.

We have described a heterogeneously processed glycoprotein with an apparent molecular weight of 55,000 (gp55) that is encoded by the Friend spleen focus-forming virus, an acute erythroleukemia virus [Dresler, S., Ruta, M., Murray, M.J. & Kabat, D. (1976) J. Virol. 30, 564-573]. Several lines of evidence suggest that a small proportion of the gp55 in infected cells is located on the surface membranes. First, different nonproducer cell lines infected with cloned Friend spleen focus-forming virus were efficiently killed in the presence of complement by cytotoxic antisera that react with gp55. Furthermore, a clone of cells selected for resistance to the cytotoxic antibody synthesized an altered intracellular form of gp55. This immunoselection procedure appears to also be useful for isolating glycoprotein mutants of other RNA tumor viruses. Analysis of cell surface proteins labeled with [125I]iodine supported the idea that gp55 occurs on the plasma membranes. However, the cell surface gp55 had more highly processed oligosaccharides than the majority of the gp55, which occurs within the infected cells. In addition, we have found that leukemia cells from mice infected with the erythroleukemic Rauscher virus complex contain a membrane glycoprotein that appears similar to the gp55 encoded by Friend spleen focus-forming virus. The encoding of similar glycoproteins by independently isolated acute erythroleukemia viruses suggests that these glycoproteins may be important in leukemogenesis.