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. 1974 Nov;71(11):4541–4545. doi: 10.1073/pnas.71.11.4541

Structure and Molecular Weight of the 60-70S RNA and the 30-40S RNA of the Rous Sarcoma Virus

Walter F Mangel *, Hajo Delius †, Peter H Duesberg ‡
PMCID: PMC433923  PMID: 4373717

Abstract

The structure and molecular weight of the 60-70S RNA complex and the 30-40S RNA species of Rous sarcoma virus were analyzed in an electron microscope after treatment of the RNAs with the bacteriophage T4 gene-32 protein to stretch out the RNA strands. Although all RNA preparations treated with gene-32 protein showed considerable heterogeneity in length, a significant fraction of the RNA retained its original sedimentation coefficient after treatment to allow the following conclusions to be made: The 30-40S RNA was confirmed to be a linear polynucleotide with a molecular weight of about 3 × 106. The 60-70S RNA exhibited a network structure with a molecular weight predominantly of about 6 × 106. Therefore, the subunit hypothesis for the 60-70S RNA is confirmed. A model for the structure and molecular weight of the 60-70S RNA postulates that the complex consists of two 30-40S RNA subunits held together at many points. This model elucidates the biological observation that the infectivity of RNA tumor viruses is proportional to the amount of 30-40S RNA in a virus preparation and not to the amount of 60-70S RNA.

Keywords: RNA subunits, bacteriophage T4 gene-32 protein, RNA secondary structure, RNA tumor virus infectivity, electron microscopy of RNA

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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