THE INTERFERON-BETA PROMOTER RESPONDS TO PRIMING THROUGH MULTIPLE INDEPENDENT REGULATORY ELEMENTS

The induction of beta-interferon is markedly enhanced in some cell typ es by a pretreatment with type I interferon itself (priming). We show that induction in response to double-stranded RNA is completely depend ent upon priming in HeLa cells. However, unprimed cells can be partial ly induced by Sendai virus, This indicates that Sendai virus can provi de a signal that is different from, or additional to, that provided by double stranded RNA. The requirement for priming cannot be localized to a specific sequence element in the beta-interferon promoter, sugges ting that priming may induce an essential component for signal transdu ction in response to double-stranded RNA.