Expression status of Tax protein in human T-cell leukemia virus type 1-transformed MT4 cells: recall of MT4 cells distributed by the NIH AIDS Research and Reference Reagent Program

• Published in: Journal of virology Vol. 71; no. 9; pp. 6277 - 6278
• Main Authors: Jeang, K T, Derse, D, Matocha, M, Sharma, O
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 01.09.1997
• Subjects: Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome; AIDS/HIV; Cell Line, Transformed - metabolism; Cell Line, Transformed - virology; Cell Transformation, Viral; DNA, Viral - analysis; Gene Products, tax - biosynthesis; Gene Products, tax - genetics; Human T-lymphotropic virus 1 - genetics; Humans; National Institutes of Health (U.S.); Reference Standards; United States; United States
• ISSN: 0022-538X; 1098-5514
• DOI: 10.1128/JVI.71.9.6277-6278.1997

Human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 (HTLV-1) encodes a 40-kDa protein, Tax, that is a transcriptional activator of the viral long terminal repeat. The popular use of MT4 cells in many biological/virological assays makes imperative a clarification of the expression status of Tax in these cells. In the course of investigating this issue, we have traced a common source of Tax-negative MT4 cells to the NIH AIDS Research and Reference Reagent Program (ARP) which lists MT-4 cells as catalog no. 120. We show by Western blotting that an MT4 cell line that has been in one of our laboratories (K.-T.J.) for more than 10 years was positive for the expression of Tax. HTLV-1-transformed C8166-45 and MT2 cell lines were similarly positive for Tax. A new MT-4 lot, positive for the expression of Tax, has been donated by one of us (K.-T.J.) and is available from the AIDS Research and Reference Reagent Program.