[Study of influenza virus 4S RNA as a primer in reverse transcription]

The capacity of influenza virion 4S RNA for serving as low-molecular primer has been studied in RNA-directed DNA synthesis catalyzed in vitro by reverse transcriptase of avian myeloblastosis virus. 4S RNA purified by 8% polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis has been shown to stimulate the reverse transcription reaction in vitro and to be RNA primer. The stimulating activity of the primers has been shown to decrease as follows: 4S nuclear RNA of the rat liver oligo (dT)12-18 4S RNA of influenza virion. the template activity of high molecular weight genome RNA of influenza virion has been demonstrated to be negligible in vitro both in the presence of synthetic and natural primer.