Cloning of the cellular receptor for feline leukemia virus subgroup C (FeLV-C), a retrovirus that induces red cell aplasia

Feline leukemia virus-C (FeLV-C) causes red cell aplasia in cats, likely th rough its interaction with its cell surface receptor, We identified this re ceptor by the functional screening of a library of complementary DNAs (cDNA ) from feline T cells, The library, which was cloned into a retroviral vect or, was introduced into FeLV-C-resistant murine (NIH 3T3) cells, The gene c onferring susceptibility to FeLV-C was isolated and reintroduced into the s ame cell type, as well as into FeLV-C-resistant rat (NRK 52E) cells, to ver ify its role in viral infection. The receptor cDNA is predicted to encode a protein of 560 amino acids with 12 membrane-spanning domains, termed FLVCR . FLVCR has significant amino acid sequence homology with members of the ma jor facilitator superfamily and especially D-glucarate transporters describ ed in bacteria and in C. elegans, As FeLV-C impairs the in vivo differentia tion of burst-forming unit-erythroid to colony-forming unit-erythroid, we h ypothesize that this transporter system could have an essential role in ear ly erythropoiesis, In further studies, a 6-kb fragment of the human FLVCR g ene was amplified by polymerase chain reaction from genomic DNA, using homo logous cDNA sequences identified in the human Expressed Sequence Tags datab ase, By radiation hybrid mapping, the human gene was localized to a 0.5-cen tiMorgan region on the long arm of chromosome 1 at q31.3. (C) 2000 by The American Society of Hematology.