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. 1997 Jan;71(1):824–827. doi: 10.1128/jvi.71.1.824-827.1997

Murine coronavirus packaging signal confers packaging to nonviral RNA.

K Woo 1, M Joo 1, K Narayanan 1, K H Kim 1, S Makino 1
PMCID: PMC191125  PMID: 8985424

Abstract

Studies of defective interfering (DI) RNAs of the murine coronavirus mouse hepatitis virus (MHV) suggest that a 69-nucleotide-long packaging signal is necessary for MHV genomic RNA packaging into MHV particles. In this study we showed that when RNA transcripts that consisted of a non-MHV sequence and the packaging signal were expressed in MHV-infected cells, they were packaged into MHV particles. Those RNA transcripts that lacked the packaging signal or those containing a mutated packaging signal did not package efficiently. Thus, the presence of the packaging signal was sufficient for RNA packaging into MHV particles.

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Selected References

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