Friend leukaemia virus-transformed cells, unlike normal stem cells, form spleen colonies in Sl/sld mice
Mager, D.; Mak, T.W.; Bernstein, A.
Nature 288(5791): 592-594
1980
ISSN/ISBN: 0028-0836 PMID: 6934375 Document Number: 158195
Neoplastic cells are characterized by partial or total autonomy from the interactions that regulate the behaviour of normal cells in the intact animal. Despite the role of the host cellular environment in governing the proliferation and differentiation of normal and malignant cells, little is actually known about these host factors. The characterization of host genes that influence both normal cellular processes, as well as susceptibility to tumor, is 1 approach to identifying such factors. Mice carrying 2 recessive mutations at the steel (Sl) locus have an environmental defect that affects both normal hematopoietic stem cell function and susceptibility to Friend leukemia virus. Sl/Sld mice were used to examine whether malignant transformation by this RNA tumor virus results in a population of cells capable of proliferating even in the defective cellular microenvironment of Sl/Sld mice. Late after infection, the leukemic spleens of Friend virus-infected mice contain cells which, unlike normal hematopoietic stem cells, are able to form macroscopic spleen colonies in irradiated mice of geonotype Sl/Sld. This observation forms the basis for the 1st in vivo colony assay for leukemic cells transformed by Friend virus.