Expression of the interleukin-3 and granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor genes in Friend spleen focus-forming virus-induced erythroleukemia

Friend spleen focus-forming virus (F-SFFV) is a replication-defective retrovirus that induces a multistage erythroleukemia in mice. In the first stage, expression of the SFFV envelope glycoprotein results in erythroid hyperplasia. Subsequently, the F-SFFV integrates near the Spi-1 gene and activates its expression, resulting in immortalized cells that represent a second stage in the disease process. We report here that media conditioned by erythroleukemia cell lines or leukemic spleen cells induced by the polycythemia-inducing strain of F-SFFV (F-SFFVp), but not medium conditioned by SFFVp-induced hyperplastic spleens, promote the proliferation of normal granulocyte-macrophage progenitor cells and of granulocyte-macrophage colony-stimulating factor (GM-CSF)- and/or interleukin-3 (IL-3)-dependent cell lines. The colony-stimulating activity of the conditioned media from four of five of the lines studied was neutralized by antibodies specific for IL-3 and/or GM-CSF, and IL-3 and GM-CSF-specific mRNA could be detected in the cells after amplification by the polymerase chain reaction. No rearrangements of the IL-3 or GM-CSF genes were observed by Southern blot analysis. However, as previously shown for SFFV-induced cell lines, the Spi-1 gene was expressed in all of these cells. Because the Spi-1 gene encodes a transcription factor whose cognate sequences are present in the promoter region of many hematopoietic growth factor genes, including IL-3 and GM-CSF, Spi-1 activation may be inducing the expression of these genes.